Enterprise - The Rediscovered Logs
by V'Kotik
Summary: Having written many stories starting late in the series, I got tired of jumping through hoops to incorporate all the writing abominations, so I started to write my own version from the start.
1. Introduction

Introduction

_I've been an Enterprise fanfic writer for about 5 years now and those, who know my stories, will remember that most of them are located towards the end of the series, often starting at the time of "Bound" or after the events of "Terra Prime". _

_For the shipping heart that is convenient, because you can start with an already establish bond and a planet Vulcan that's not ruled by blithering idiots, but other than that it is a right pain in the backside. For the best part of the first two seasons the writing was (pardon my French) a monumental clusterfuck and it got only marginally better later on. The fourth season then was a marked improvement, but was soured by that unspeakable contrived angst-spectacle around Trip and T'Pol. _

_Archer was portrayed as someone, who should be doing just about everything, but not commanding a star ship. The Vulcans were militaristic fools, who mistook logic for abandoning common sense by blindly following a government that was so corrupt they almost started to bribe themselves. T'Pol turning drug addict, Archer sending away a rapist unpunished, everyone was speaking English by episode seven, that's just a short list of abominations that one has to carry through if starting late into the series, endlessly jumping through hoops to incorporate the bad writing earlier on. _

_For just about every story that doesn't aim at being an angst-fest you have to write a chapter at some point during which T'Pol has to explain, what in the name of all that's holy was going on in her head when she decided to do drugs. With this project I'm aiming at writing my idea of Enterprise regardless of the TV series, in a universe in which we won't meet a new hostile of the day in every chapter, where Starfleet doesn't just send them on their merry ways with no support, no stations to turn to and that doesn't retro-actively diminish the novelty-factor of Kirk's Enterprise. _

_Some key moments from the TV series will still feature here, but in different circumstances. _

_Have fun everybody. _


	2. The Consultant

**The Consultant**

Shivering slightly as the cold air of the night chilled her sensitive skin, she closed her faux leather jacket to suppress the unbidden reaction of her body to the cool temperatures. This was the distinct downside of wearing human clothes – they did not possess the thermal lining of the Vulcan 'cat suits', as the Humans referred to the garment. The logic of naming the apparel after an animal that hid its small build behind fur in a way that made it look much sturdier, did most certainly elude her. Besides the attire did the exact opposite.

This is why she did chose not wear it when visiting places that hosted many humans engaging in recreational activities. Vulcans did not pay attention to superficial attributes like the shape of their bodies, which was after all only a shell for one's _katra_. For humans apparently it did matter, because the younger specimens eagerly worked on the configuration of their outer shells, some even having parts of their body surgically optimized for appearance. Since human males did not encounter any condition like the _plak-tow_, evidently evolution had programmed human males to react to visual stimuli and human females with the ability to provide it through their appearance.

Obviously her own appearance fit into Earth's more preferred profiles and as a result she received an inordinate amount of scrutiny from human males. The decision to purchase human clothing that did not emphasize her physique as much as the Vulcan attire had been made easier by a young human female, whom she had met by chance when she was visiting a human shop to procure apparel. The young human had introduced herself as Hoshi Sato and had provided advice on which clothing would make her less noticeable. What she remembered most about her unexpected guide was that she spoke Vulcan without a discernible accent. Notably while Ms. Sato was skilled at selecting clothing, she had selected her own clothing which appeared to have been crafted during severe fabric shortages.

She regretted having to wait until nightfall before venturing out into the human city. Her temperature problem would have been less severe during the day, but openly expressing interest in getting to know human culture had become a hazardous undertaking since Administrator V'Las had come to power. Why so many Vulcans preferred to be ignorant of the fact that the new government's decisions often lacked logic was hard to understand. Many of them were most likely associated with V'Las's clan and therefore accepted his erratic leadership for political or personal gain – a mindset that a small number of years ago would have been considered illogical and unseemly.

Almost weekly, Vulcans were recalled home, their position at the Earth Embassy filled with new arrivals that either belonged to clan _dvinsu ekon-ak_ or wished to belong to it, trying to ingratiate themselves with the ruling clan through servitude and arranged marriages. Forcing down the momentary disgust at such a disagreeable weakness of character, she continued her way back to the Vulcan compound.

Apparently it was now her turn to be recalled. Soval had alerted her and suggested a clandestine meeting at United Earth Starfleet's headquarters under the guise of consultations about the launch of the first warp five capable human vessel. The humans had estimated that the ship would be ready for trials in a month's time. Much to her and Soval's indignation, the High Command had made it known that they wished the launch to be delayed by as much time as possible without alerting the humans. These orders were outrageous.

After carefully observing her surroundings she entered the ambassador's office using his private door, which allowed her to remain unseen by any of the compound's denizens, who might feel inclined to report her illicit excursions..

=/\=

"Won't you at least think about my offer, Malcolm?"

Malcolm Reed eyed the man with suspicion. He would have thought that Harris got the clue about his intention to end to his career as a pet assassin by his request to be transferred out of the section and into the fleet. And as if that wasn't a clear enough hint, the fact that he was willing to accept a de-facto demotion to Lieutenant should have been a dead give-away as the fleet had all but retired the rank of Lieutenant-Commander. Sometimes Harris was just too bloody thick or just impertinent. Who could know with this man.

"I had assumed that I have made my intention abundantly clear, Captain, Sir," Malcolm said and put an annoyed emphasis on the man's official rank.

"We've just had Falkner walk out and now you. How can I work without the best men I have?"

He didn't buy the flattery. "With all due respect, Sir; If you would have used your 'best men' for something other than exterminating people like flies for almost two years now, maybe we would both still be here. We used to be an organization that worked for the good of Earth. Now we're just like the bloody _Camorra_, minus the ransom demands. You've been ordering assassinations a dozen for a sixpence. That's no longer the section I signed up for."

"You know that certain things are necessary," Harris insisted cryptically and Malcolm felt like socking the man.

"People like you, Sir are responsible for the god-awful image we have with the Vulcans. Every other week a runabout ploughs into the undergrowth and hover cars have developed rather worrying explosive tendencies. The Vulcans can smell a flea's fart from a mile away and hear it, too. Did you really expect them not to notice? Now the Vulcans require Starfleet to test every new device or vessel repeatedly before allowing it into service."

"Well, I guess I can't change your mind," Harris sighed theatrically. Malcolm suppressed a snort. How much more pathetic pleading would he have to listen to before being dismissed?

=/\=

Maxwell Forrest moved Soval's small device from his pocket to his hand and surreptitiously activated it with his palm. Calmly he looked at the models of various current and retired ship designs that were lined up in the glass case on the wall. When he felt the pulsations of the device, he slowly moved along until the vibrations started getting weaker again.

_No doubt, Tos really isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, _he thought to himself in reference to Soval's slippery deputy ambassador, who couldn't have his arrogant nose farther up V'Las' rear-end if he were a sniffer dog for haemorrhoids.

_You'd think he'd get tired of this, _Maxwell cackled mentally as he removed the small listening device attached to the back of the model of the _Grand Canyon_, the first ship he had served on as a fresh-faced ensign.

_Let our recycler sing you the song of our people, _he mused as he dropped the little device into the chute.

Only moments later he saw Soval approach with a female in tow – a very attractive female.

"Maxwell," Soval said in way of greeting and Maxwell answered in kind. "Was your harvest bountiful?"

"Same old," Maxwell said and couldn't suppress a chuckle. "He didn't even bother to look for a different hiding place."

"It is fortunate that Tos appears to be the quadrant's most inept operative," Soval delivered dead-pan and both Soval and his female companion raised their eyebrows in unison, which Maxwell assumed meant, that like the ambassador she was amused.

"May I introduce – Subcommander T'Pol," Soval explained with a nod at the woman. "I have mentioned her before."

"Indeed you have," Maxwell replied and exchanged nods with her, before directing his attention back to Soval. "So what did the toads in _Shi'Kahr_ come up with this time?"

"T'Pol has been recalled. The reasons are of no concern. What is of concern is that she will most likely be persecuted."

"If you mean to ask for asylum," Maxwell interrupted before the Ambassador could voice such a request.

"Not at all, Admiral," Soval denied much to the admiral's relief. "I would not wish to bring you into such a precarious political situation. But I wish to nominate her for the Consultant role you suggested. It would be most helpful if she was selected."

"How would that help?" Maxwell asked back. "If they want to take her away from Earth and back under their thumb, the High Command wouldn't possibly agree to that."

"On the contrary," Soval said and handed over a PADD.

Maxwell thumbed through the translation of a Vulcan directive in which Soval was instructed to get Subcommander T'Pol installed as an operative on the experimental human vessel. After exhausting all options to delay the launch of the vessel, he was to exert influence on Starfleet, so that the vessel's first long-distance test flight would be one to Vulcan, where Subcommander T'Pol would be exchanged for a surgically altered operative.

_Stalin had nothing on that man, _Maxwell thought with disgust. Clandestine reports stated that being 'exchanged' was just a euphemism for replacing someone with a surgically prepared doppelgänger and disposing of the original by termination or exile to some barely hospitable remote outpost. _Bet that doesn't come from Surak's writings, _he seethed to himself.

"I hope you have a plan to avoid the last part?" he asked the ambassador.

"Sadly, we will have to rely on the ingenuity of your 'highly qualified crew'," Soval confessed.

"That's a tall order, but if anyone can do something about it, it's this lot. Even though, if your crew evaluation is anything to go by we're sending out a bunch of ne'er do goods and dimwits. They are less than pleased with you."

"It was by necessity," the Vulcan explained. "I had to make them appear somewhat less competent to discourage the High Command from taking more disagreeable actions to keep humanity under their control. As long as they are convinced that the crew will fail in their endeavour to start a human presence in the grander inter-planetary community, they will hopefully abstain from anything more drastic. Once the ship has been launched their options will be more limited."

"Well, it certainly helped to keep up your image of a cranky old Vulcan," Maxwell said with a grin. "I'm not sure I could deliberately make myself unpopular like that."

"Another unfortunately necessary precaution," Soval explained and the admiral got the distinct impression that this revelation was for the benefit of the young Subcommander. "My position in the clan, if revealed, would make me a target of the High Command. As long as they are convinced of my alleged negative preconception about humanity I can safely continue my work here. You will surely understand the ramifications."

"Oh, I do," Maxwell agreed, trying not to imagine, in too much detail, having to work with Tos."

"I do however have one justified doubt about a member of your proposed crew," Soval said and Maxwell knew instantly, who that would be.

"Let me guess – Commander Charles Anthony Tucker III."

"Indeed," Soval confirmed. "His personality does not strike me as someone fit for the position of Chief Engineer on an experimental vessel."

"That particular personality is carefully crafted," the admiral explained. "Trip Tucker is one of the sharpest minds we have in the Corps of Engineering. That ship wouldn't be halfway finished if it wasn't for his ingenuity. Trust me, if or when the Enterprise crew comes up with a plan to keep your Subcommander here out of the clutches of the High Command, there is an extremely high chance that it was his idea."

"Where then is the logic of hiding one's own competence?" the young woman spoke up for the first time. Would it not be an obstacle to his professional advancement?"

"That is, because he is exactly where he wants to be. If it was up to the top brass, he would be the youngest Captain in Starfleet and head a team in R&D. But by keeping up his drawl and his 'explosive' character, he makes sure he's not on top of anyone's promotion list."

"Most peculiar," Soval stated.

=/\=

With his hands flying over the navigation console of Starfleet's state-of-the-art simulator, Cadet Travis Mayweather directed the virtual vessel through an equally virtual asteroid field. He had flown such manoeuvres since he was old enough to look over the console, but this wasn't a warp two cargo barge, but the simulated pride of Starfleet – the warp 5 ship, NX-01 _Enterprise_.

If he messed that one up and leave a mark on the hull, he wouldn't be asked to paint them over at the next stop - he would fail his exam and the shiny new Ensign-pips would remain a distant dream. Nothing would be worse than proving his older brother Paul right, who saw his wish to become a Starfleet officer as some sort of betrayal. At least his parents had encouraged him and defended him against the self-righteous reproaches of his sibling.

"Very well, Cadet," the instructor acknowledged the successful exit from the Asteroid field. "And now we make a U-turn and do the same in a nebula with broken impulse engines."

"Lost impulse, switching to manoeuvring thrusters," Travis reported dutifully to the non-existent Captain and started to turn the behemoth.

_This is it, _Travis thought. _I'm going for the alpha seat. _He knew very well that this test was not part of the repertoire to pass the normal flying exam. They were testing skills far beyond his StarFleet training, but, he grinned, it was something that every boomer had done at least once in his life when running from Nausicaans or Orion Marauders. They were testing his adequacy for alpha-shift duty.

=/\=

She sat down in her quarters in the Vulcan compound and inserted the data disk she had received from Ambassador Soval into a secured PADD. His warning to abstain from reading it on any device that was connected to the High Command controlled network hinted that the contents were not meant to be discovered by the authorities.

When she accessed the storage chip, she was prompted to enter the security code of the house _T'Klaas_ – a key that was usually only applied to intra-family communication originating directly from her Eldest Mother. Very few possessed the clearance to access such information.

_Daughter of the House of _T'Klaas_, _

_The latest developments on Vulcan are reason for great concern. Several members of our house and the wider clan have been apprehended on fabricated charges and the whole house is in danger. As the only member of the house, who will come of childbearing age in the next thirty cycles of _T'Kuth_ it is of utmost importance that your life is preserved. _

_The High Command has ordered to recall you, ostensibly to allow you the necessary time to enter marriage. The High Command of course does know that your childhood betrothed claimed another female as his mate and has meanwhile survived the blood fever twice using her help. Lamentably for the children, the authorities refuse to recognize their union on the ground of their inability to bond. That they cannot, because the High Command has outlawed mind-melds, including the ritual bonding-melds is a fact that is of course conveniently omitted. _

_Save yourself, daughter of our house! I have instructed Soval to seek for you to find shelter among Humans. They might appear immature and volatile, but that is merely what the new administration wants Vulcans to believe._

_I have included the log recordings of your father. Contrary to what the High Command believes, he is not deceased. He has spent the last two cycles in hiding. Your mother has joined him after the latest purges. I have never approved of his peculiar habit to record spoken logs of his life, but in the current situation, the recordings might help to secure your continued well-being. _

The recording ended and T'Pol scrambled the contents of the transmission using an enhanced version of her retired _V'Shar_ code. Putting the PADD away, she raised the room temperature by 4 degrees and undressed for a shower. One of the few creature comforts available to her was that she was accommodated in the part of the complex that had not been newly built, but was a refurbished building inhabited by Humans before adding it as a means of additional housing to the Embassy. As a result of that it featured a human water based shower instead of the Vulcan sonic showers.

Letting the hot water and the resulting steam engulf her body, she started to process the transmission from the Eldest Mother. The house _T'Klass_, the second most important beside the house _Suurok_ within clan _Sh'hiran'lin'iijyliunh'rei'iy'iukn'hy'wen'lhia'ehrm'n_, was being persecuted by the High Command and to add to her bewilderment, she had learned that her esteemed father V'Nur, whom she had believed dead for the last half decade was apparently alive and in hiding.

It was likely that this evening's meditation would take additional time.


	3. Let's Meet & Greet

**Let's meet**

Jonathan Archer left the posh house in one of the ritzier parts of San Francisco feeling morose. Becoming a Starfleet Captain had been a life-long dream, ever since he had started playing with starship models. But the price was excruciating. Minutes ago Erika and he had come to the conclusion that their relationship was no longer sustainable.

Truth be told; It was her doing the reasoning, while he fought tooth and nails not to cry and to keep up the façade of agreeing with her. In reality he just wanted to run, hide somewhere and pity himself while sobbing into his beer. But that was of course way too unseemly for the son of Henry Archer, who had finally been cleared for taking command of the first vessel propelled by his late father's engine.

There were times during which he thought, the thing would never fly. If it wasn't for A.G.'s help to steal the NX-Beta and Trip's genius to bring the early engine prototype through all the additional Vulcan prescribed tests after A.G had blown up NX-Alpha, the engine would still wait to break the warp three barrier. Without Maxwell Forrest keeping him out of the clutches of Starfleet's terriers, like Admiral Black, he would not be looking at his first command now. Instead, he would probably be on a holiday resort for cockroaches in a Penal Colony on some of the Alpha Centauri outposts.

But it had cost him the relationship with Erika. He was now a Captain and she remained a Commander, which could lead to problems with the fuddy-duddys at Starfleet Command, all because of the stupid no-fraternization regulations. As if grown people weren't able to keep private and duty-related things separated – this wasn't High school. Loudest among the defenders of the no-frat policy was of course Black, who was so damn conservative; it was a minor miracle that he used PADDs instead of parchment scrolls and carrier-pigeons.

He took his communicator out of his pocket and flipped it open a bit more forcefully than absolutely necessary. A chirp announced that the device had connected to the pre-programmed code. His conversation partner announced his name as a greeting.

"Hi Trip, it's Jon. Do you have an hour or two?" he said, looking around if any people would end up unwilling eavesdroppers.

"Sure. You don't sound like you're too well. Everything ok?"

"Let's say I could use a beer or twelve. Care to share some?" he asked back, changing direction towards Trip's Starfleet provided home, which was not too far.

"Every time, where are you? Need me to pick you up?"

"Not necessary Trip, I'm in the area. Be there in fifteen."

=/\=

_Not only do they bust my sorry arse __back __to Lieutenant, _Malcolm thought. _No, my very first task as a newly-minted crew member of a ship that isn't even properly nailed together yet is to provide a taxi service from Brazil for an Ensign. She does look awfully nice though._ He looked at the PADD with the service record again. Her face was perfect in every single way. Having grown up in Malaysia he had a preference for cute Asian women.

The last thought brought him back to the grim reality though. No matter how gorgeous she was, the difference in rank automatically put her off-limits and it was academic anyway. Describing his success with the females of the species as less than stellar would be a ridiculous understatement. Scoring a shag or two here and there wasn't the problem. All it took was to hint nebulously that he was some sort of secret operative – that got every pair of knickers wet in a bloody hurry.

But as soon as the reality of dating an operative hit home, mainly the fact that he took off for weeks to kill someone to death, who had probably looked at Harris cross-eyed, it was usually over in an instant. The lady folk were just too damn demanding these days. They sought for a supermodel, who was good at house chores, didn't need sex anymore than once or twice a month and told them they're the most beautiful creature in the quadrant – even if they looked like a meat loaf.

Whatever happened to partners just making each other's life a bit more complete without expecting or even demanding the impossible from each other? He was rattled out of his mental ruminations by the com message from Manaus approach control, which cleared him to fly his shuttle on a straight-in approach course to Manaus Spaceport. That would save him at least half an hour and straight-in arrivals were usually parked close to the terminal, too.

=/\=

Trip woke up, feeling like he had been run over by a truck. Damn it all, it had certainly gotten late, but Jon had needed the talk with a good friend. That it was fueled by an entirely unsuitable amount of beer was a lamentable, but insignificant detail. The hangover was bad, but today would mainly consist of checking and re-checking the installation of EPS components, something he could do without speaking to people or being spoken to too much, so it wasn't all bad and Jon would spend most of his day touring the ship anyway, so what the hell, a guy can get sloshed once in a while, can't he.

"Morning," John grumbled and Trip had to bite his lip to avoid laughing at Jon's clumsy attempts to get off the couch, where he had crashed last night. "How bad are you feeling?"

"Manageable," Trip shot back. "But that's really a question that I should be asking **you.**"

"I'll manage, too," Jon said. "Got a lot off my chest. Sorry for loading it all off on you."

"Don't be ridiculous, Jon," Trip waved the sentiment off. "That's what friends are for. And you know I wouldn't miss a chance at having a really good excuse for a beer. Although it could have been at least half a dozen less."

"Roger that."

"Excited about the first day as the skipper?" Trip asked.

"Sort of; Anything you can tell me about the senior crew?"

"Pretty much the best of the best," Trip said. "Your XO is the groggy one you're looking at. Science is not decided yet, same goes for CMO. Security chief and tactical officer is a British guy called Reed, Lieutenant. He's apparently some sort of former spook. His service record can be summarized in one word: 'classified'."

"Great; really great."

"Don't moan just yet. The guy hits whatever he shoots at. Undefeated Academy shoot'n champion in every year he took part and on top of that in every weapon category. Some people from his team told me, his party piece was opening a bottle of beer from across the shooting range with single stun blast. "

"Ok, so he can shoot things," Jon admitted. "Is he available already?"

"Got his papers yesterday," Trip said and started to pour them some coffee to jump-start their battered bodies. "I've sent him to Brazil to pick up Hoshi Sato, the coms officer."

"She's some sort of language wunderkind. According to her academy file she learned no less that 32 languages in just the four years on the academy. Wrecked the curve in every class she attended. Still holds the point's records on math, cryptology, linguistics and xeno-linguistics exams. We got ourselves a little genius there."

"So, if I'm to believe that, Starfleet is fresh out of genii, because they will all be on my ship."

"You know what they say about genius and insanity…," Trip hinted vaguely, before remembering the biggest news. "Speaking of madness: Starfleet News."

It was good to hear Jon laugh.

"In about 4 hours," he explained looking at his watch. "You'll get a visit from a Subcommander T'Pol. She'll be stationed as a Consultant on the ship."

"Ok, now they do not only crank up the test plans at the last minute and wreck our schedule. Now they even want to put a damn spy on my ship? I'm not putting up with that. I'll have to talk to Max about that."

Trip waited silently for Jon's rant to be over. It didn't take a psycho-analyst to work out that Jon had some issues with Vulcans. He was pacing the living room, mumbling to himself. Jon seemed to have noticed his silence and looked back at him.

"You're not going to say anything?"

"Jon," Trip ventured carefully. "I think it's not that bad an idea. We're getting to places where not even the boomers have been yet. Unless we want to get out and smash into every asteroid there is, we need star charts from the Vulcans. I can't read them and I doubt you can."

"I've never even tried."

"See?" he continued. "It's only temporary, too. Our first LD test will be to Vulcan and back. We're supposed to drop her off at home. If Hoshi Sato is as good as they say, she'll have the charts translated by then."

"Guess we can manage," Jon admitted. "But how does she fit in with the crew?"

"There's nothing in the regulations that forbids assigning her temporarily as Science officer, is there? You cannot put her in the chain of Command, obviously, but she could handle the science console."

"I'll think about it after meeting her."

=/\=

The shortened approach into Manaus and the fact that some eager-to-please young petty officer had delivered the ground car directly to the landing spot meant that he was over two hours early and Ensign Sato had apparently left final preparations to leave until the last possible moment. Malcolm didn't like such tardiness. The rationale behind building a Starfleet Language Institute in the middle of the rain forest completely eluded him. The wooden shacks nestled together on a clearing were looking comfortable and well built, but they made the whole arrangement look more like one of those all-inclusive holiday resorts than a place where peoplem would learn languages. They might even have a pool if the nearby splashing noises were any indication.

"Ensign Hoshi Sato?" he called out while leaving the car and the answer came promptly from where he had heard the splashing noises. Walking into the direction the answer had come from, he arrived just in time to see a young, beautiful woman wade out of a small lake wearing the most outrageously skimpy bikini he'd ever seen.

_A __dancer__ would be charged with indecent exposure if she wore something like that on stage, _Malcolm thought dumbfounded.

"You must be Lieutenant Reed then," she said walking over to the small blanket she had laid out. He was standing near the arrangement and took her offered hand, even though it was wet.

"I had not expected you this early," she added.

"Well so much is obvious," he said, slightly tongue-tied. He tried not to ogle her appearance too obviously. As if that sorry excuse for a bikini wasn't ridiculous enough, she dropped the top and toweled off her topless form as if she did that every day in front of a superior officer. With a trace of chagrin he realized that she must have noticed his perplexed look. He saw her standing before him with a lopsided grin and apparently completely oblivious to or unconcerned about the fact that she was treating him to a view that he wouldn't forget anytime soon.

"Don't tell me you're squeamish, too, Lieutenant," she said, rolling her eyes.

"Squeamish, Ensign?" he asked back, acting nonchalantly.

"Like the people around here," she said and put on a shirt.

Malcolm relaxed, now that the somewhat awkward moment was passed.

"Normally I wouldn't wear such a stupid thing," she said and let the waist band of the bottom piece snap back against her skin. Malcolm was worried that she would be dropping that next, but she gathered her few belongings and started walking slowly towards the shacks while continuing her explanation.

"When I started here a year ago, it didn't even enter my mind to wear anything for a bath, but then one of my pupils saw me and he was so scandalized he made the sign of the cross and started to pray. If you consider the fact that just 20 miles from here is an Awá-Guajá village, you'd think people wouldn't freak out by the sight of a naked woman.

"Well, it depends on what your pupil was praying for," Malcolm quipped. "It could have been a 'thank you god for that image'."

"Aww, Lieutenant," she replied with not very convincingly played abashment.

"I'll wait here," Malcolm said as they passed the ground car. "Please, call if you need help with the luggage."

"Not necessary, but thank you," she declined and sauntered away, leaving Malcolm behind to stare transfixed at her delicate derrière.

_Blimey, she's a trip and a half, _he thought.

=/\=

"_Audio Log Entry, index five-five-nine, recorded by Commander V'Nur of Vulcan."_

"_To my displeasure, due to the missing cycle of day and night, I have lost count of how many days I have now spent adrift in space in an escape pod. As a result of the unfortunate problem, I lack the necessary data to estimate how long I can continue to sustain my live. I am nearing the point at which I shall have to come to a decision of either terminating my life or risk a slow agonizing death by starvation and dehydration. The increasing rarity of picking up life-signs of my fellow crew members leads to the conclusion that some have already made this decision for themselves. Especially the younger ship mates are more likely to have starved to death already, as they lack the necessary knowledge to prolong their potential life-span by drifting into a trance regularly."_

"_Our last known position was in a region that is traversed by several trade routes. I therefore retain hope that the escape pod's signal is registered by a passing merchant or patrol vessel. I shall uphold my routine of regular narrated log entries. The Eldest Mother would most likely dismiss this practice as overly sentimental, maybe even emotional, but such reproaches do not concern me."_

"_Many fellow Vulcans have become solely concerned with upholding their conformity with the majority. They repress their emotions instead of processing them. An emotion of fear is caused for a reason. If one mechanically represses it he might miss the signs of danger, which caused it. Nothing is as contentment-inducing as dwelling for a moment on the emotions that touch my katra when I see my beloved wife or my beloved daughter. It is my dearest hope that I may one day reunite with them as their absence leaves my katra incomplete."_

A cold shiver alerted T'Pol to the fact that she was still unclothed and the environmental controls had started to throttle the temperature back to save energy. She had been so immersed in her father's log recordings that she had barely made it from under the sheets to sitting on the edge of her bunk. She was now close to being late – a most unusual tardiness. She grabbed a light bath robe and went straight to the bathroom for a shower.

=/\=

Captain Jonathan Archer was nearly finished reading his notes. Once in a while he looked up to see if all of the senior staff had arrived yet. Uncharacteristically it was Trip, who was not yet in the room. Even Lt. Reed, who had picked up Ensign Sato from Brazil and had only landed an hour ago, had made it to the conference room. Just as he was about to direct his attention back to the last paragraph, the door opened and a damp-haired Trip walked into the room.

"Sorry, Cap'n," he said. "A coolant conduit blew and I got it all over me. Trust me; that's a smell y'all don't want to sample, so I took a shower first."

"It's ok, Commander," Jon said calmly. "Welcome everybody to the first staff meeting – the first of a great many, I hope."

All eyes were on him and he checked the reaction of their Vulcan guest. There wasn't any – unless the raised eyebrow accounted for anything.

"Let me begin with the introductions. The man with a habit of taking coolant showers is Commander Charles Anthony Tucker III, our chief engineer and first officer. If the lights in your quarters don't work, nag him, not me."

John ignored Trips eye-roll with a benevolent grin and fixed his glance on the Vulcan. "Our Vulcan guest is Subcommander T'Pol, who will temporarily fill in the position of science officer. "

The Vulcan acknowledged her introduction with a nod.

"The British gentleman to my right is Lieutenant Malcolm Stuart Reed, our chief of security and the tactical officer and a damn fine marksman if I've been informed correctly."

The man also didn't give much more of a reaction than a curt nod. _He must be fun at a party, _Jon thought.

"The young lady next to him is Ensign Hoshi Sato, our communications officer and – as I'm told – humanity's best xeno-linguist."

He smiled about the slight blush on her cheeks. She looked quite young for an officer.

"And last but not least, as of four hours ago, Ensign Travis LeVar Maywheather, our chief helmsman – a pilot with a flogging waiting for him, because he beat the pants off my over 20 year old flight test record."

John joined in the light amusement around the table. Well, all but Reed and the subcommander were amused. These two seemed to try to out-Vulcan each other.

"I don't want to make it much longer than that to give you all time to settle in. We are entering the final phase of construction, so you'll spend the next weeks getting your departments ready. Subcommander, since your position is temporary, it would help if you worked closely with your second in command."

"Of course, Captain."

"Very well, dismissed."

He watched the officers file out of the room.

This Vulcan Subcommander was an enigma. She was like every Vulcan he'd ever met – aloof, taciturn and rigid. But somehow she didn't project the usual aura of arrogance. It almost seemed as if she actually wanted to be where she was.

And she was pretty; she was definitely pretty.


	4. A Helping Hand

**A Helping Hand**

Jon was seriously considering asking the quartermaster to make a sign that read 'do not salute me'. He could wear it around his neck. All he wanted was to tour Earth's first Warp 5 ship. He knew of course that protocol and regulations demanded that noncoms salute before an officer, but it was patently impractical, especially on a ship in the final stage of completion.

There were toolboxes, measuring equipment and ladders everywhere and people hurriedly climbing down the ladder, just to stand at attention for the moment he passed them was simply ridiculous. It was bordering on the dangerous actually. He would deal with that in a first standing order. It was more than enough to acknowledge his existence with a nod and only if they were on the same altitude.

That young engineering crewman, who had jumped off the ladder and botched the landing could have seriously injured herself if it wasn't for the fact that she had practically landed in his arms. It had taken him quite some time to convince her that she wasn't going to be spaced for her 'improper conduct'. He knew of course that his reputation preceded him – that was the disadvantage of carrying the name Archer – but he didn't like the hero worship. He hadn't done a single thing yet as a Captain that would warrant any fawning over. He directed his thoughts back to _Enterprise_.

It sure was an impressive ship. There were loose ends to tie up everywhere, but the sheer size of it was a clear sign that humanity was ready to make the next step. She might be looking small in comparison to some of the Vulcan cruisers, but the pointy eared know-it-alls had a century or two of a head start. For Earth this was a monumental achievement. The Vulcans had more than once tried to offer a technology transfer, but thankfully Starfleet had resisted the temptation, as that would have meant more Vulcan influence and more Vulcan nannying. And that was something they needed least of all.

Every single bit on this ship was designed, developed and manufactured by humans. And the man mostly responsible for keeping this going was Trip. He had walked the corridors and laboratories for three hours now and he had encountered Trip no less than five times in different areas of the ship. That man was simply always on the move. One time he explained welding techniques to a young crewman, the next time he could be seen instructing one of his engineers on the finer points of calibrating the flow regulators of an EPS conduit.

He made a mental note to invite Trip to a chat and a game of water polo the next days. That man needed to wind down a bit. As the ranking officer until Starfleet could finally come to a decision whether A.G. or him would be the skipper, Trip had overseen most of the recruiting, so there was a lot he had to pick his buddy's brain about.

He saw Subcommander T'Pol coming out of what would be one of the science labs, if he remembered the deck plan right.

"One minute please, Subcommander," he called out. He saw the Vulcan stop. She acknowledged his request with a wordless nod.

"Care to join me for a few meters?" he asked and indicated the direction in which he planned to continue.

"Of course, Captain."

"I was wondering if the Vulcan compound had any medic to spare, who has experience with both Vulcan and human physiology," he asked.

"May I ask why you would wish for a Vulcan medical officer?" she asked back and there was that raised eyebrow again. "I got the impression that you were not too satisfied with Vulcan influence on your mission."

"You are right about that," he admitted. "But since your people aren't very forthcoming with details about – well anything – there is no human medic qualified enough to treat Vulcans. Even though you are only assigned to us temporarily, I will not leave space dock until we have a chief medical officer, who can treat you as well as the rest of the crew."

He spared her a sideways glance. She walked beside him, steps perfectly synchronized with her hands clasped behind her back. He could see that she gave his proposal some thought.

"Your consideration honors you, Captain. I believe there is another option that may be more agreeable to you. There is an Interspecies Medical Exchange, organized by the Vulcan Academy of Science. As part of that operation there are several medics working on Earth. Most of them are Vulcan, but there is a Denobulan doctor, named Phlox."

"Denobulan?"

"A planet that has been visited by Earth freighters regularly over the past twenty years. They are a species that has no problem with open expression of emotions, which would make it easier for the crew to interact with him. They are highly advanced in medical and genetic science. A Denobulan medic is not taken seriously on their world if he doesn't hold at least five degrees."

"And this Phlox is here on Earth and willing to join the crew?" he asked her.

"If he is willing to join the crew is a question that only he can answer himself. I do know however that he is fascinated by humanity. I would venture to suspect that he would be unable to withstand the temptation of being part of humanity's first deep space mission."

"Thank you, Subcommander," he said with a smile as they came to stop in front of the turbo lift. "I don't want to keep you from your tasks any longer. You've been a great help."

"You are welcome Captain. Do you perhaps know where I can find Commander Tucker? I seem to be unable to locate him and my request does not warrant the use of a biosensor sweep."

"Good luck with that," Jon said with a chuckle and he saw that mysterious eyebrow creep up again. "He's been all over the ship. Why don't you just contact him with your communicator?"

"Starfleet apparently saw no necessity to issue me any communication devices nor any communication codes."

Jon fought down a flash of anger that quickly turned to shame, when he realized that two days ago he would probably have seconded that decision. That was before he finally had a chance to talk to her. Ashamed by his own prejudice, he zipped open the arm pocket of his uniform.

"Have mine," he said and handed her the device. "Ask Ensign Sato to establish a communication profile for you and reprogram the communicator. And if you find the time please consider yourself invited to dinner in the Captain's mess at nineteen hundred. Tell Commander Tucker to come, too when you find him."

"Thank you, Captain."

John did a double take as the slender Subcommander disappeared into the turbo lift. Did a Vulcan really just say 'thank you'?

=/\=

Trip was buried deep in the bowels of access hatch D17, lying on his back. He looked at the chaos before him. Who the hell had devised that layout? He looked up and taxed the moody plasma flow regulator. These things were known to be slightly fragile, so why did they put them in places that would require Houdini to pry them out? He swore out his disapproval and kept working on the part that he had fought with for the better part of half an hour.

When he looked down along his own body he could see two legs in front of the opening of the hatch. They were clad in brown cloth and only one person wore brown carpet colored suits – their new science officer.

"Can I do something for you, Subcommander?" he called out and of course he knew something must be on her mind, else she wouldn't have contacted him on Jon's com frequency about twenty minutes ago.

"Maybe, my request can wait until later."

"Bullcrap," he replied and prepared to crawl out, before he remembered something.

"Subcommander, can you open my toolbox? There should be a number of small V-shaped clips in the top drawer."

"There are." she answered after a while.

"You better put one on your nose to clamp it shut. I'm not exactly smelling like roses right now," he warned her.

When he had wiggled his way out of the cramped space, he had to fight hard not to laugh. She looked simply ridiculous with the clamp over her nose, but considering that he could barely stand his own odor right now, it was a worthwhile trade-off.

"Sorry 'bout that," he said and indicated her face. "But I've spent the last half hour in a cramped space at over 40 centigrade. I'm stinking like a polecat. I don't know much about Vulcans, but I've heard about your sense of smell."

"Your consideration is noted," she replied with a distorted voice.

"What can I do for you?"

"I was meaning to ask if you could spare a crewman to adjust the life support system in my quarters. The environmental controls do not let me select any temperature above 25 degrees centigrade."

"Right, you come from a desert planet," he contemplated. "That's nothing a crewman should do. When does your shift end?"

"Eighteen hundred," she quacked in her distorted voice and Trip realized it sounded somewhat cute. But what really impressed him was the way she accepted this. Most other Vulcans would have just gone mute for fear of their precious dignity being tainted. "We have been invited to dine with the Captain at nineteen hundred after the shift though."

"How high do you need to adjust it?" he asked, acknowledging her info with a nod and poking away at a PADD with the specs of the life support systems.

"Mean temperatures on Vulcan are at about thirty-five degrees centigrade. Unless I can raise the temperature in my quarters to at least thirty degrees, I would need to sleep in full uniform or order a much more substantial duvet."

"Got thermal lining in it, doesn't it? The uniform, I mean." he asked.

She nodded. He didn't remember having seen a Vulcan use that gesture before.

"Tell you what, T'Pol," he said. Suddenly catching his error, he added: "Sorry, may I call you that?"

"You just did," she replied dryly, but it did not sound the least bit offended.

"My friends call me Trip," he offered in return.

"I'm sure they do," she shot back deadpan.

"Anyway," he continued, ignoring her cold rebuff. "Dinner probably takes an hour or so. I'll drop by afterwards and adjust your systems."

"I am sure one of your engineering crew members can do that?" she argued. "I don't think my personal comfort warrants inconveniencing the chief engineer."

"First of all, crewmen have no business entering the quarters of an officer, unless it is an emergency," he explained. "Much less one from a species that values privacy as much as you do. And without wanting to toot my own horn, I think I'll get the job done faster than most of my people."

"As you wish, Commander," she said with that clamp-induced distorted voice of hers. "Do I need to keep this device?"

"Well, I'm gonna take a shower before I show up at dinner," he promised. "But I would keep it. There's more people working in hot environments and you really don't wanna know what it smells like if the captain's dog gets wet. So I'd recommend you keep it to use whenever neccessary until we have a doctor, who can maybe numb down your sense of smell. We work with a lot of substances around here that are unbearable to humans. I don't want to find out what they'd do to that pretty nose 'o yours."

"Very well, Commander. I will expected you in the evening."

"Better keep that thing on until you're out the door," he advised her with an apologetic smile.

=/\=

Hoshi was programming the communication profile for Subcommander T'Pol. She looked over and saw the Vulcan stand patiently with her hands clasped behind her back. She pressed the com button on her console.

"Ensign Sato to Lieutenant Reed."

"Reed here."

"Lieutenant I need your approval for a line officer communications profile. Where should I send it?"

"The security office is currently powered down and crawling with engineers. Where are you Ensign?"

"In the linguistics lab on E deck."

"I'll be with you in fifteen minutes, Ensign. Reed out."

The connection went silent.

"I can't believe they didn't even give you a communicator," Hoshi said grumpily. "I thought Earth and Vulcan were allies."

"There is still a lot of distrust between humans and Vulcans," T'Pol said. "And considering some of the decisions the High Command has made lately I would call it an understandable sentiment."

"Are you sure I was supposed to know that?" Hoshi said with a smile.

"Unless you prepare to report it to the Vulcan authorities I fail to see a problem."

"Don't worry," she said affording the Vulcan another bright smile. "It all stays in here. How did your first few days go? I suppose it isn't too easy getting used to be among so many humans."

"I have been posted at the Embassy long enough. I am quite used to be among humans. I find my tasks here much more challenging than the discomfort of being exposed to so many emotions."

"Problems?" Hoshi asked back, surprised by the Vulcan's openness. Their pointy-eared allies weren't exactly known to speak openly about their problems.

"As the science officer I have many crewmen under my command, including you. My style of command has not been overly effective so far."

"That will take time," Hoshi explained. "We are all not used to take orders from a Vulcan and with all due respect, you need to learn how to handle some people. If you want my advice, I'd say you might want to consult with Commander Tucker once in a while. I've only been here as long as you, but I've already noticed that his department is by far the most popular."

"That could prove to be difficult. I have noticed Commander Tucker's willingness to help, but consultations with him could be somewhat inefficient as I often find myself unable to comprehend his language."

"That drawl is something else, isn't it," Hoshi said with a giggle.

"When I assured him that my request was not important enough to warrant interrupting the work he was doing at the time, he replied with the term 'bullcrap', which as far as I know is a vulgar term for the excrement of a male bovine. It did not make any sense in the context of our conversation."

Hoshi laughed softly. The subcommander was really in for a tricky endeavor if she wanted to make sense of Commander Tucker's colorful language.

"'Bullcrap' or 'bullshit' are euphemisms for nonsense," she explained. "His language can be a bit colorful, especially if he's annoyed or angry. Was there anything that could have left him irritated?"

"He was working in an access hatch with little room for movement and high temperatures that were most discomforting. As far as I could overhear before he acknowledged my presence, he wanted to insert his boot into someone's derrière for placing a plasma flow regulator in an inaccessible place he did not approve of. He did not seem to know the person, but felt compelled to refer to him or her in rather disparaging terms."

Hoshi couldn't help but laugh about the Vulcan's bafflement when presented with Commander Tucker's vocabulary.

"I'm sorry, Subcommander," Hoshi apologized for laughing. "Since I am the communications officer, maybe I can help you with that. I'll set up a database for you and you can collect the phrases that confuse you. When you have the time you can drop by and I'll try to explain them to you."

"That would take up a significant amount of your free time, Ensign. Commander Tucker's predilection for colorful metaphors would fill up the database most rapidly, especially if I were to consult with him about my command style on a regular basis."

"I don't mind giving up my free time and my offer isn't entirely unselfish," Hoshi said, smiling at her superior officer. She liked how easily the Vulcan engaged in conversation. "I was hoping to practice my Vulcan, too. There are several dialects that I need to improve on, Golic for instance. From the way you pronounce the e's and o's I'd say you come from the _Rh'Lar_ region. I haven't had much chances to practice that dialect."

She saw a very elevated eyebrow on the face of the subcommander.

"_Most impressive. My residence is indeed in_ Rh'lar,_" _the subcommander answered in her native Vulcan.

"_I find your approval most gratifying," _Hoshi answered in kind. She really started to like the subcommander and in a way it was sad that her stay on the ship would be temporary. She pledged to use any possible opportunity to practice her language skills. Before they could launch into a full-fledged conversation in Vulcan, the entrance of Lieutenant Reed interrupted them.

Hoshi looked at him and had to stiffle a giggle. He had been so cute when her topless act in Brazil had flustered him. Maybe if the opportunity presented itself, she could put in a repeat performance. His blush was so adorable. Too bad the rules made it impossible getting to know him better and since she was still on probation for breaking her superiors arm, she couldn't really risk it, even for _Enterprise's_ enigmatic but definitely interesting security chief.

"What can I do for you Ensign?" he asked and acknowledged subcommander T'Pol's presence with a nod.

"I've created a communication profile for Subcommander T'Pol, but I'm not sure what security clearance I should attach. There is no precedent for a line-officer from a foreign force on one of our star ships."

"What is your assignment status, Subcommander?"

Hoshi was surprised about the stern undertone in his voice.

"I am assigned to the diplomatic corps of the Vulcan High Command. For the duration of my assignment to _Enterprise_, my association with the High Command is suspended. I do not have any obligations to them and I have no plans to introduce any on my own volition."

_She doesn't like the High Command, _Hoshi mouthed and signaled the same in sign language behind the subcommander's back. The Lieutenant nodded and she was surprised that he understood sign language. She knew he did, when he signaled '_take_'. It was just a random word, but to the subcommander it would look like a halfway natural hand movement, while he was still getting the message across that he had understood her.

"Ensign," she heard him say as if the clandestine conversation had not happened. "Apply the security clearance of an O-4 line officer. Additional clearances can be added as needed."

"Aye, Sir," she acknowledged and added the necessary flags to the profile. She handed him the PADD and he added his approval. Hoshi smiled when their hands touched lightly while he returned it to her.

"Ensign, Subcommander."

After nodding to both of them he left. Hoshi was still smiling.


	5. Chain Of Command

**Chain Of Command**

T'Pol entered her quarters after finishing her shift and – quite illogically – she tried to raise the temperature. She knew that Commander Tucker would not modify her environmental controls until after the dinner with the captain, but considering the almost exaggerated effort on behalf of the humans to integrate her into the crew, she wouldn't have been surprised if he had somehow devised a way to make the necessary adjustments earlier.

While that theory had just been disproved, she was nonetheless most satisfied with her first few days on the human ship. The crew of Enterprise were people, who wanted to explore and therefore were considerably more open-minded and more willing to accept an alien among them than many other humans she had met over the years. Captain Jonathan Archer was known to be skeptical about Vulcans and considering the efforts of the High Command to delay the launch of the human ship, it came as no surprise that he harbored resentments. His father had been the principal designer of the engine and had been denied to witness the launch of his design by illness and the stalling tactics of the High Command.

Commander Tucker was difficult to understand. He seemed quite willing to help, when help was needed and he seemed to possess better knowledge about Vulcans than his captain, but he also seemed to be compelled to turn even trivial situations into something he could amuse himself with. He was the only one, who had given thought to the strain the odor of humans would put on her olfactory senses, yet he did so with a device that made her appearance amusing to him. On the other hand she had seen two humans use the same clip, when she had inspected the recycling facilities deep in the belly of the ship, so there was the possibility that they simply preferred form over function, even if it made them look ungainly. It was a topic worthy of contemplation.

Lieutenant Reed – according to the information she had been given by Soval – was a former operative in a secretive human organization that even the V'Shar had little information about. The control he possessed over his emotion was impressive and she wondered if he had been posing as a Vulcan at some point of time in his former assignment. She made a mental note to herself that she needed to ask him to certify her for use of human hand weapons. Even if her assignment should remain temporary, there was a possibility that they could find themselves in a combat situation and she would be at great risk if she had not been instructed in the handling of their small arms.

Ensign Sato was so far the most accommodating of her new ship mates. It was the same young woman she had once met in a human shop. She had helped her procure human clothes that would help conceal her physique to reduce undue attention from human males. Interestingly, for herself she had selected clothing that achieved the exact opposite. She looked much too young to be an officer, even though according to her service record she was indeed twenty-two years of age. That was young, but quite old enough for a posting as an officer by human standards.

Interestingly, her service record also mentioned that she was currently on a two-year probation period. She would be discharged from Starfleet if she would be charged with any further offenses. The record did not mention what offense she had been charged with. That was most unusual, even for humans. Her instincts as a former operative in the Ministry of Security told her that something about this situation did not seem correct. She had seen such cases in the High Command forces before. Mentioning the offenses that led to charges was only omitted if those charges were fabricated or if mentioning the offense would implicate higher ranking officers in wrong-doing. She decided to keep a watchful eye over the young female in case she would be unfairly targeted by Starfleet. The ensign had gone 'out of her way', as humans used to say, to help her and it was the least she could do in return.

A glance at the clock informed her that her reflection on some of her fellow officers left her thirty minutes to prepare for dinner with the captain and Commander Tucker.

=/\=

A loud bang resounded in Engineering

"Ow, shit, goddammit!" the chief swore. "Shit, that hurts!"

Two crewmen came running, grabbed the commander's leg and dragged him out of the access hatch. He was clutching his bleeding right hand. With a trained eye Lieutenant Anna Hess, his second in command and the department's dedicated first-aider, inspected the wound and applied a makeshift bandage.

"Billy, bring him to sick bay," she ordered and the crewman escorted the chief toward the medical facilities.

=/\=

Trip entered sickbay still clutching his right wrist. It didn't help in any way with the damned pain, but somehow gave him a feeling of security that his hand was still where it was supposed to be.

"Ah, my first patient," the doctor greeted him entirely too cheerful for the situation. He was of a species he had not see before. Prominent ridges ran from his high forehead around the eyes to his cheek. A smaller upside-down Y-shaped ridge adorned his chin.

"I had a bit of an argument with a plasma flow regulator. I lost," Trip groaned when the doctor peeled the bandage off. It was by now soaked through already.

The doctor inspected the would and came back with a shallow bowl containing a clear liquid.

Trip was still wondering what it was, when the doctor grabbed his wrist and wordlessly dunked his hand into it. He almost passed out when his whole hand seemed to be on fire.

"Oh shit!" he growled "What the hell is that, acid?!"

"The pain will subside quickly," the doctor answered, still infuriatingly cheerful.

Soon the burning sensation went away and his hand was now buzzing like it used to do when he came back inside after playing in the snow without gloves as a child. The nurse, a pretty young woman started bandaging his hands. He smiled at her apologetically.

"Two days and it will be as good as new," she said and smiled back at him.

"Thanks, crewman," he said and hopped off the biobed, before addressing the doctor. "What's the verdict? Do I get to keep the hand, doctor?"

"Just some burns," the alien said and flashed him an impossibly wide smile. "But I suggest you settle your arguments with your technology by different means."

Trip laughed. "I'm Commander Tucker. Will probably not be the last time we meet. Engineering is not exactly the safest place, especially with so much experimental technology around."

"I'm prepared," the doctor answered, still grinning.

"Do you have something to put over the bandage to keep it dry? I've got dinner with the Captain in twenty minutes and I need to take a shower beforehand.

"Thanks doc," he said and took the plastic cover that he was handed by the alien. "By the way, you are...?"

"Phlox, my name is Phlox."

"Commander Tucker, pleased to meet you, doc."

=/\=

Jon saw a pattern developing here. The steward had already started putting down the plates and cutlery and there was still no sign of Trip. He was sitting at the head of the table. His science officer was sitting ramrod straight to to the left of him. Trip's place was to his right. Finally the door opened and Trip walked into the room, his right hand bandaged.

"Sorry, Cap'n," he started to apologize, but Jon cut him off by raising his hand.

"What happened?" he asked, pointing at the bandage.

"Got too cocky, that's what happened," Trip said. "Thought I could rip out a plasma flow regulator and push the new one in fast enough so I don't need to reroute plasma flow. I was wrong."

Jon laughed. Trip always had a knack for trying to get things done faster than others.

"Why do we need to replace parts already?" he asked. "We haven't even left space dock."

"Because most of the parts have been delivered by the lowest bidder. Those regulators are just fine at warp four. But this is supposed to be a warp 5 ship. If we try to go faster than four point five half of engineering will blow up in our face. They just assumed that we won't go over four point five anyway."

The steward delivered the meals. He set down a bowl of vegetarian broth and a copious salad in front of T'Pol and delivered pasta dishes for Trip and himself. Since this was the first meal with their Vulcan officer, they had decided not to risk offending her by tearing into big slabs of meat.

"What are you replacing them with?" Jon asked. It sounded a bit ridiculous to install flimsy regulators if better parts were available.

"Backbone regulators from a Marconi class," Trip explained in between bites. "They only do two point five, but the plasma pressure in their backbone ducts is higher than what we would get if we were able to reach warp six."

"And we just happened to have those lying around?" he asked with suspicion. Something smelled fishy and it wasn't his food.

"No I got them through BuShips. I have a few contacts there. Spared us a lot of red tape."

Jon put his fork down and fixed him with an offended look.

"Asking the ship's captain obviously didn't enter your mind, did it, Commander."

"Uh,...,Cap'n," Trip stammered and he could easily identify the confusion about the sudden formality on Trip's face. "I mean if we'd done that through official channels, we'd still be waiting for a decision if we will even get them."

"Commander, I would have every reason to confine you to your quarters, right now. In case you wondered what that fourth pip here is for," John said sternly and tapped his rank insignia. "It says 'Captain' and that means any business with people from outside the crew goes through me. Did I make myself clear?"

"Perfectly, Captain."

"You will provide updated specs, calculations and a detailed engineering report about the deficiencies of the original parts by tomorrow morning. I'll deal with Admiral Forest and BuShips to get the change legalized retro-actively, but for that I'll need those reports. Is that understood?"

"Aye, Captain."

The rest of the dinner proceeded in awkward silence.

=/\=

"Come," Trip said grumpily, when the door chime of his office in Engineering announced a visitor.

The door opened to reveal that his visitor was Subcommander T'Pol. He looked at the clock – 21:08.

"Damn," he swore under his breath. He had forgotten that he had promised to adjust the environmental systems in her quarters.

"I'm sorry, Subcommander," he said sincerely. "I forgot the time, I'll be with you in a minute."

"It is no longer necessary. I have already talked to Lieutenant Hess. She volunteered to make the necessary adjustments."

"And I'm not being...," he stopped mid sentence and sat down back on his char. He finished the sentence with a sarcastic voice. "Asked. Pot calling the kettle black."

He looked over at his guest and saw a very elevated eyebrow. It could be the Vulcan equivalent of laughing at him.

"As I said, Lieutenant Hess has just left to make the necessary changes. I came to your office for a different reason. I estimated that the amount of documentation that the captain demanded could not be produced by a single person in the given time without completely foregoing sleep. I am here to offer my assistance in producing the requested documents."

"Well, I'm not going to turn down an offer like that," he said with a grateful smile and held out a wheeled office chair for her. She gracefully sat down on it.

He sat down on the chair next to her and pointed at the screen. I'm currently updating the plasma flow diagrams at speeds over warp four point five."

He saw her nod and she rolled her chair over to a second desk with a terminal.

"I shall begin updating the schematics of the respective plasma conduits."

"Thanks a lot, subcommander."

=/\=

Stanford wasn't doing well. How could they give away a game as easy as that? It was almost as if they had gone on strike. Frustrated he stopped the recording.

"Come," he called, when the door chime rang. The door opened and Trip entered his quarters with a stack of PADDs.

"Trip?" he asked curtly.

"I've got the docs you wanted," he said. "But first let me say sorry for doing the regulator deal without notifying you. I wanted to get those things as soon as possible and sort of forgot that I'm no longer the ranking officer. It won't happen again."

"That's why I had to remind you that the ship has a Captain, now," Jon said and took out two glasses and a bottle of Bourbon. He saw Trip nod when he held the bottle up as a way of asking.

"Well, consider me well reminded," Trip said sincerely.

"That's why I didn't press disciplinary measures. You've been in charge for months. But you need to get that out of your system in a hurry. I need a first officer, not someone, who questions my authority or does back-room deals behind my back. You wouldn't even have updated the specs."

"No, I wouldn't have," Trip admitted.

"So they would have pumped out the next NX ships with the same shoddy regulators. You're the guy who gets the first NX running. All subsequent ships will be built relying on your expertise. We need those docs."

"But there's the problem," Trip pleaded. "I got those regulators within four hours with barely any paperwork. That's the only reason why I got the crew evaluations done in time. My day only has twenty-four hours. Chief engineer and first officer that's an impossible combination."

"Why haven't you told me?" Jon asked.

"I'm telling you now," Trip said and by the way he tiredly ran his fingers through his hair, he could tell that the man was running himself ragged. "I've only noticed the last two days. Until the bridge crew was completed, there was no First Officer, no crew evaluations and a whole lot other bureaucracy to deal with."

"We have no other Commander on board and Reed won't be promoted anytime soon," Jon explained.

"We have," Trip said and Jon shot him a questioning look. "I've checked the database. Subcommander is equal to our rank of commander."

"She's a consultant and only assigned on temporary basis," he reminded him.

"Something's not adding up, Jon," he said. "She strikes me as someone, who actually wants to be here and Hoshi told me over lunch that T'Pol doesn't like the High Command. Why would she leave Earth, where she's far away from their supervision to go back to Vulcan?"

"What makes you think that she wants to be here?"

"Who suggested Phlox?" Trip asked before pointing at the stack of PADDs. "And do you think I did all those by myself? I'm an engineer, not a magician. An hour after dinner she showed up in my office and offered to help, because she had worked out that I would have not a cat's chance in hell to get those docs done without pulling an all-nighter."

"T'Pol helped you with these?" Jon asked in disbelief and poured another glass.

"You should see her at work. She types faster than I can read. She solves quadratic equations faster than I can add up one and one. It was absolutely amazing. Now, tell me, would you give up your free time for an assignment you don't care about?"

Jon thought about it. Trip had a point. She wasn't like any other Vulcan he had met. It was as if she went out of her way to blend in. She didn't complain about 'unseemly emotions'. She had not offered any criticism, even though their Bolognese at dinner contained meat and Admiral Forest had recommended her with a raving review that made it look as if he was trying to marry her off. Something really didn't add up.

"Hm," he said downing the rest of his Bourbon. "I think the two of us should have a little chat with our Vulcan guest tomorrow."


	6. Twisted Logic

**Twisted Logic**

"What the hell is this all about?" Trip asked, walking next to the captain. "You ask T'Pol for a private chat and - **boom** - here come Forest and Soval?"

"I'd say your theory about her motives has raised a few alarms," Jon said. "There's definitely something going on behind the scenes and I can't shake the feeling we weren't supposed to find out – or at the very least not yet. Can't say I like being left in the dark."

"You think she's been installed as a spy?" Trip asked, questioning his prior judgment. After all, they only had Hoshi's statement that T'Pol claimed she didn't like the High Command. That was easy to say. Maybe he had let his judgment be clouded by her generous offer to help with the documents and her general willingness to fit into the crew?

"I don't think so," Archer said, interrupting Trip's wandering thoughts. "I have a feeling her posting was not as temporary as we were made to believe. If she were a spy, I think Reed would have sniffed her out by now. You said yourself that he's some kind of former spook. That means he knows what signs to look for."

"I thought this was all about exploring and now we're caught up in politics by the looks of it," Trip said frustrated.

"When the Vulcans are involved, it's always about politics," the captain replied with an equally frustrated undertone. "Let's wait what they have to say. It could be something completely different even though I doubt it."

=/\=

"Good morning, Ensign," Malcolm offered as a greeting when he walked into the linguistics lab. As always Ensign Sato returned it with a blindingly beautiful smile. He had to fight the urge to smile back. It was hard enough not to show how much it affected him, especially as he had quickly noticed that except for the bloody yank from engineering and himself, no other officer received a smile quite this radiant from the beautiful ensign.

Out of the frying pan and into the fire, he rued his fate in his mind. Leave one job that makes it impossible to have a woman and get caught up in one where it is forbidden to begin with – bloody brilliant.

When he had shaken his self-pity she was still looking at him.

"Have you you found out what frequency band these buggers were using?" he asked, looking at the selection of small devices on the palm of his hand.

"Oh, that wasn't too difficult," she said and Malcolm noticed a distinct amusement in the young ensign's voice. "The whole frequency band they were transmitting on is assigned to the Vulcan Embassy. And you were right; they are simple listening devices with the most ridiculously easy-to-crack encryption I've ever seen."

"The Vulcan embassy installed these listening devices on our ship?" he said, angry and frustrated that the first thing he had noticed was, that the ship had been bugged by an outside force.

"Looks like it."

"I believe I need to have a word with our Subcommander," he snorted. "I don't think listening in to the what happens in the Captain's ready room or the armory is part of a science officer's job description."

"Are you sure it was the Subcommander?" she argued. "I believe her when she says that she's not exactly fond of the High Command. Why would she spy on us for them. It doesn't make sense."

"Words are cheap, Ensign," he replied. "She has been a trifle too accommodating so far, don't you think? If you listen to Commander Tucker, you'd think she's the biggest thing since sliced bread. I had to listen to him waxing lyrically about how much she helped with getting the documents done for the Captain. She types faster than he can read, does complex mathematical calculations in her head faster than he can program them into the computer. That's an awfully sophisticated training for an ambassadorial aide."

"Are you sure you aren't just paranoid?" she asked. "According to the ships log there have been dozens of Vulcans on the ship during the construction and who knows, maybe they just bribed someone of the crew to install them."

"Bloody Norah, how could I forget that!" he spat and hastily opened his communicator. "Reed to Ensign Taylor!"

"Taylor here."

"Capture protocol 'Ear', countdown minus thirty."

"Capture 'Ear' T minus thirty, aye."

"Bloody hell," Malcolm began to berate himself for his sloppiness, but he was stopped by the com chime.

"Archer to Reed."

Malcolm walked over to the com panel and replied to the hail.

"Lieutenant, would you mind joining us at airlock seven?" the captain requested.

"On my way, sir," Malcolm said and turned back around towards Hoshi. "Thank you for spotting my... oversight, Ensign."

He turned and left the room.

"Now I just need to convince Phlox to surgically remove that stick you've got up your ass, Lieutenant," Hoshi said with a sigh and a lopsided grin, but the target of her quip and her dreamy glance was already out of the door and couldn't hear it.

=/\=

Malcolm arrived at the airlock, where Captain Archer, Subcommander T'Pol and that blond-haired yank were already waiting. The Captain looked, well captain-ish, calm and collected, while the mien of the Vulcan gave away exactly nothing. She could bankrupt the lot at a poker game, he thought. He was determined to find out what she had to do with the current situation.

The yank, well he was his usual self – grinning at everyone like a blithering idiot, engaging the Captain in useless smalltalk. He had a hard time believing that this was the man, who had come up with a theory that hit so close to home it would prompt both the Admiralty and the Vulcans to see fit coming for a visit. For what he had seen of the man so far, he ticked each and every box on the stereotype checklist for rednecks, including, but not limited to, the atrocious accent at times.

His mental evaluation of the fellow officers was cut short by the loud beep that announced the end of re-pressurization. The airlock door opened and their two visitors stepped out.

"We should take this conversation to a more private location at all haste," Soval said without as much as a greeting and the captain directed them to the captain's mess.

As soon as they had arrived, both Soval and Admiral Forest started to walk all over the room with scanners until both came to stand in front of him.

"Are the gentlemen by any chance looking for these?" Malcolm asked them dryly and took a handful of the miniature devices out of his pocket and piled them up on the table.

"How many have you found?" Soval asked.

"Fifty-three," Malcolm said with a snort. "They were literally all over the ship. We even found some that were sown into the hem of my undershirts.

"Someone bugged your underwear?" the captain asked in visible disbelief. Even the bloody yank had the decency to look scandalized.

"Obviously. What better way to undermine a ship's security than listening in to what its security officer has to say," Malcolm replied.

"What is your assessment of their sophistication, Lieutenant," Soval asked him, stowing away his scanner.

"Some of the hiding places where actually quite good," he explained. "But the devices themselves are the work of a bloody amateur. Their transmitter unit is completely unshielded, so our communications officer noticed the unaccounted for traffic the first time she fired up her console and the encryption – I quote – was 'ridiculously easy to crack'. Whoever had these installed either thinks we are roaming the streets at night, licking windows or we've uncovered the galaxy's most useless spy."

"The latter," Forest and Soval said in perfect unison, causing the human contingent to chuckle, well all except himself.

"Would you care to tell us what this is all about?" the captain asked and Malcolm could see that despite his momentary amusement, the man took the situation quite personally. That would make them two already.

"What we are about to disclose to you is to be considered highly classified information," Forest said. "Nobody not currently in attendance must learn of what Soval is about to disclose. Did I make myself clear?"

All officers answered in the affirmative.

"Four years ago, V'Las, a long-time member of the High Command ascended to the highest post in the governing body – that of Administrator," Soval began his narrative. "He is one of the Elders of clan _dvinsu ekon-ak_, a smaller clan that never played a prominent role in Vulcan politics or the society at large. Shortly after his ascension to power several older ministers were forced to resign, ostensibly due to their old age and were replaced by younger men, all of which came from the clan _dvinsu ekon-ak _or houses allied to it through strategically arranged marriages."

"The classical groundwork for establishing a dictatorship," Malcolm noted.

"Indeed," Soval acknowledged and continued. "In recent months the purging of dissident voices has become increasingly aggressive. In several cases the whole house, sometimes even the wider clan are summarily punished. Lately these purges have been extended to diplomatic personnel of our Embassy here on Earth."

"And T'Pol's one of them?" the chief asked. Malcolm fought down a snort. The yank couldn't even keep proper protocol. He doubted severely that a Vulcan of all people had offered him to be on a first name basis.

"Subcommander T'Pol, myself and several other Embassy staff are members of the clan _Sh'hiran'lin'iijyliunh'rei'iy'iukn'hy'wen'lhia'ehrm'n_."

"I wanna see **that** name tag," the yank joked and Malcolm gripped the armrest of his chair. The Ambassador was describing what could be a massive conspiracy and that redneck clown knew no better than joking about names. Who had made that man a Commander?

"It is here," the Subcommander replied and pointed at an elaborate Vulcan symbol on the collar of her catsuit, to the obvious amusement of the chief. Malcolm nearly groaned. Great, now she of all people started to humor that pikey and his ridiculously unprofessional attitude. But what really riled him was that the other attendees, including the Ambassador and the Admiral seemed to be completely blasé about it.

"And I suppose your clan is not part of those, who marry into the Administrator's clan," he stated in a clipped voice in an attempt to bring the discussion back on track. The death stare he got from the yank did not elude his attention.

"No, our clan is in fact the major target of the High Command," Soval explained.

"What has your clan done to deserve so much attention from the authorities and how does our science officer fit into this?" the captain asked.

"Our main offense is that several houses of our clan are descendants of Surak and his first followers," Soval answered. "The High Command claims sole interpretative authority over the teachings of Surak, the father of Vulcan logic. However, this claim lacks credibility if a whole house of his descendants and his first disciples is working in prominent positions."

"You and T'Pol are descendants of Surak himself?" the chief asked.

"We are of the house T'Klaas, the first _kohlinar_ master."

"So, pretty close to Surak then," he asked back.

"Yes."

"If you don't mind my asking, Admiral," Malcolm interrupted. "What sense does it make that we do our first test flight to Vulcan? We could end up delivering the Subcommander straight into the hands of the High Command."

"Soval got a direct order to install Subcommander T'Pol on this ship and have _Enterprise_ do the first long range test flight to Vulcan. We wanted to make it look as if he succeeded to secure his post here. At the end of your test flight the High Command are planning to take Subcommander T'Pol off the ship and replace her with a surgically altered double," Forest explained.

"I take it that the original would no longer be of any use for the High Command, once the exchange has been completed," Malcolm analyzed dryly.

"Doubtful," Soval replied deadpan.

_Ah, that's what it is about with these two, _Malcolm thought sarcastically when he saw the sick-as-a-dog look on the yanks face. _Someone's got a crush on the Subcommander. _

"And when exactly were you meaning to let us know about all that?" the Captain asked and Malcolm saw the rigid stance of the man. There was no prize for guessing that he was short of blowing a gasket.

"Right after you shoved off," Forest explained. "I know Jon, this sucks, but we were worried about agents among the crew and station personnel. Once you are out in space you are safer than you are here."

"We will know about that in five minutes," Malcolm forestalled the captain's reply. He sensed that all eyes were on him.

"Five, four, three, two, one," he counted down a few minutes later and a klaxon started blaring all over the ship.

"All security personnel, security breach code E, this is no drill – repeat – security breach code E, this is no drill..."

The message repeated a few times and the klaxon went silent.

"What the hell was that?" the chief asked.

"Just me doing my job," Malcolm answered snidely, noticing the tone of his voice too late to catch this lapse in professionalism.

"Care to elaborate?" the captain asked curtly.

"Unless either my second in command or our communications officer is an agent for the High Command, someone will try to salvage a few of these little buggers before it is to late in the next few minutes," Malcolm said, pointing at the pile of listening devices on the table. "All we have to do is wait."

=/\=

"I have noticed a substantial tension between Lieutenant Reed and Commander Tucker," T'Pol said. She was visiting Ensign Sato in the communication officer's quarters for one of the lessons in rarer Vulcan dialects she had agreed to.

"That's not really surprising," the young human replied. "They are polar opposites. Lieutenant Reed can barely bend-over with that stick up his butt and Commander Tucker is laid back. That can't work out too well."

"Stick up his...?"

"Oh, sorry," the ensign said with an expression of amusement. "I believe we have found the first entry for your 'colorful phrases database'. If someone is said to have a 'stick up the butt' means that someone is overly strict, inflexible and uptight."

"I do not see professional behavior as a reason to apply a rather distasteful metaphor," T'Pol explained.

"He is overly formal and it's a facade," Hoshi said. "I'm a communications expert and body language is a language, too. The mere fact that he quite often comes to the linguistics lab for things we could have easily dealt with by communicator makes it quite obvious that he's interested in me. More than once I noticed that he nearly called me Hoshi instead of Ensign. Yet he keeps pretending that I'm just another ensign to him."

"That would be an unseemly familiarity between an officer and a subordinate," T'Pol replied. She wondered if the young Ensign was aware of how obvious it was that she reciprocated the Lieutenant's interest. Whenever she spoke of him – even if criticizing him – her face expression changed substantially.

"I don't know what they were thinking," Hoshi replied and T'Pol was taken aback by the sudden angry undertone in the Ensign's voice. Maybe those no-fraternization regulations work for the military down on Earth. They can go home for the weekend and they can have a significant other they can see regularly. We are preparing to go out for months, maybe even years. It's not only unrealistic – it's inhumane."

"How long can humans function without... intimate contact?" T'Pol asked, wondering why Starfleet had not considered this aspect of their nature.

"It depends on the individual," the young ensign explained. "Some actually manage to do so all their lives, but that are exceptional examples. Humans are gregarious by nature and most of us cannot live comfortably if we are denied the close, intimate contact of a loved one for months or even years. We can force ourselves to endure it, of course, but in the end it does more harm than good."

"It is certainly a topic to be brought to Starfleet's attention, is it not?" she asked. The thought of spending her time on a ship full of human males deprived of intimate contact did not appeal to her.

"What for?" she heard the clearly frustrated reply of the young human. "The rules were made by people, who serve on Earth. They can go home each night where their husbands or wives are waiting for them. For them we are just brave explorers, who don't have any needs. We don't need comfort, we don't need company and we surely don't need sex. It's all working perfectly – for them at least."

"How does that relate to the tension between Commander Tucker and Lieutenant Reed?" T'Pol asked, trying to get the conversation back to its original topic before the Ensign could become even more enraged.

"Trip... Commander Tucker just helps himself to some of the things that make his life easier." her host explained. "He is on first name basis with all his engineering staff. They meet after duty and engage in recreational activities. Now going strictly by the rules, even that could be interpreted as fraternization, but he doesn't care. He wants to make the life of his people and his own as comfortable as he can. Lieutenant Reed can't overcome his drilled-in formality to do the same and it makes him jealous."

"Lieutenant Reed experiences jealousy because of his inability to break the rules?" T'Pol asked. That was the most fascinating twist in logic she had ever heard.

The young human nodded. "If it was for him, he would surely have asked me to share a meal with him by now, or maybe even a meeting after duty hours. But he can't take the plunge to just ask me. Commander Tucker would just do so – regulations be hanged. He envies that. It makes him angry and he projects that back on Commander Tucker."

"Most fascinating," T'Pol said, now understanding why Commander Tucker had been so elated when she had offered no protest over his omitting her rank in conversation.

"Most dangerous!" her human host suddenly said loudly in visible shock. "I believe they both booked gym time at 1800 today. It's 18:20 now. We should run!"

In slight confusion she ran out of the young ensign's quarters, barely able to keep up with the pace of the young human.


	7. Tension

**Tension**

_A/N: Thanks a lot to Bernie for the beta reading :)_

Trip stalked towards the gym in a foul mood. Not only had the damn Limey made it more than clear that he didn't like him much, on top of it the Brit's security crew had also caught two of his engineering crewmen red-handed, as they scrambled to remove some of the listening devices when the alarm sounded, not knowing that they were already in the possession of the ship's security officer. That two of his own engineering crew had been working for the corrupt High Command felt like a very personal insult.

Massaro and Ngoma had been two of the more quiet members of his team and even Anna had sometimes had her troubles working out how to handle them – and she was the people's person extra-ordinaire. Well, now they at least knew why.

He couldn't find anything bad to say about the efficiency with which the ship's uptight security chief had done his job – he certainly knew how it's done – but that didn't mean he couldn't use a darn good attitude adjustment. They would be going out for months, maybe even years cooped up in a small space. There was no place in such a close space for someone, who acted like he was preparing to slay Highlanders at Prestonpans.

Since the small gym required time booking, he knew the Brit was currently the only one using the small facility and now was as good a time as any to get it over with. He wouldn't want to confront him where subordinates could hear it. Whatever problem the uptight guy had, it didn't warrant undermining his authority in front of noncoms or junior officers.

The door to the gym opened and he found his fellow officer pummeling the punching bag, swearing fiercly under his breath in Gaelic, which was a surprise considering that the security chief was more English than that King they stubbornly kept retaining despite Britain having long since stopped being an isolated nation. They had been one of the last nations to step under the umbrella of the United Earth government and they insisted on having a King or Queen, no matter what.

On the other hand it was equally unusual that he, as a supposed redneck, would know any foreign language, let alone the old dialect of the Irish. Being an Irish Folk aficionado wasn't a very common 'affliction' in the south as many of the descendants of Irish immigrants preferred the northern states. It wasn't hard to guess that he was the topic of the Lieutenant's vulgar soliloquy as he offered several rather outlandish theories about his mother's ancestry and her preference for rather uncommon intimate partners while continuing to punch the hapless leather bag in a veritable rage.

"_Do we have a problem, Lieutenant?_" he asked in flawless Irish Gaelic. While the Brit obviously thought he would be safe from being found out unloading on a fellow officer verbally, he had actually chosen the one who appreciated a good Paddy Reilly tune and could practice the language once in a while when he visited his brother Jay in Dublin.

He had to force himself not to laugh out loud about the Lieutenant's 'deer-in-headlights' look. He was obviously ill-prepared for being caught by the same officer he had just cussed off fiercely. Trip enjoyed seeing the momentary look of defeat in the other man's eyes. But Reed was a former spook. He had probably gotten himself into and out of more tight spots than the sole vibrator in an all-girls boarding school, so Trip didn't feel like gloating just yet. As expected the Brit shook off the momentary shock with trained ease after mere moments and noticed that the man fixed him with a steely glare that would come in very handy to intimidate lesser opponents.

"I'm afraid I don't understand your question, sir."

"Oh you don't?" Trip replied sarcastically. "Well let me help you then. You made it quite clear that you don't think much of me during the meeting this morning. You probably think I spend my evenings on a mechanical bull hollering 'yee-haw' all the time. Well, you are mistaken, Mister. Whatever problem you have with me, you better tell me right now."

"Permission to speak freely, sir."

"Who am I? Stalin?" Trip asked with an indignant snort. "Of course you've got permission to speak freely. In fact I would like to ask you do so before we end up getting into each other's hair in front of subordinates."

"I never implied you were an idiot, but you have to admit that your conduct is less than professional. This isn't a cruise ship in the Caribbean."

"It isn't a barracks of the Royal Navy either," Trip spat. "If you want to be a drill sergeant, parading and shouting orders all day, then go and join the fucking Navy. This is a ship of exploration and Starfleet isn't the army."

"I do not think it is your right to decide where I should serve!" the Lieutenant shouted back and Trip wondered why the man, who could so far give T'Pol a run for the money in terms of suppressing his emotions, was suddenly reacting quite openly hostile. True, he hadn't delivered his riposte in the most diplomatic fashion, but the sudden outburst of the otherwise very controlled Brit was a surprise.

His face had been red from the exertion, but it had now gone pale in anger and he could see the rage in the man's eyes. Every fiber in his body screamed at him to back away, but that would definitely not help right now.

"No it isn't, but you are running around here like you'd be more comfortable in a MACO uniform," Trip ranted. "We have certain rules and those must be followed, true. But their enforcement is the captain's job, not yours, got it? If you have a problem, then take it to me instead of taking it out on a fucking punching bag that doesn't fight back."

"Preposterous!" the younger officer sneered at him. "You know full well that if I knocked your redneck arse to the floor, I'd find myself court-martialed the next day."

"Not if I challenged you to a sparring match," Trip growled and took a pair of boxing gloves that were hanging on the wall. Using his teeth for help he fastened them and looked back at the Lieutenant, who was glowering at him. He threw him a packaged mouth protector, biting on the one he had unpacked for himself. Once they were ready they took their positions on a mat that was usually used for training judo or other forms of martial arts.

"So what is it, Lieutenant?" he taunted him, barely understandable due to the mouth-piece. "Would you prefer to punch this here leather bag and develop theories about the sexual preferences of my mother or are you man enough to take on an opponent, who actually fights back?"

"I'm ready," the Brit replied curtly and the two men started skipping and bouncing around each other with quick steps, trying to find an opening in the other man's defenses.

=/\=

The doors to the gym opened and Hoshi came in, fairly out of breath, followed by T'Pol, who looked like it wasn't any sort of effort at all to run across half the ship. She stopped dead in her tracks when she saw her worst fears proven true. The boxing match looked like it had gone on for a while already as both men had redecorated each other's faces quite thoroughly.

Lieutenant Reed's lip was swollen and blood trickled from a cut on his right eyebrow. Commander Tucker seemed to have taken quite a lot of abuse as his right eye was swollen shut and his complete right cheek and temple were covered in partially dried blood. Some of it had dripped down on his muscular chest, leaving traces of dried blood on his torso.

"What the fuck are you two doing?" Hoshi shouted and forcefully slung her arms around Lieutenant Reed from behind to stop him from advancing on Commander Tucker again. She saw how T'Pol 'arrested' Commander Tucker. Both men tried to struggle free for a while, but they had thoroughly drained each other of most of their energy and were unable to escape the grip even of someone as small as herself. Following T'Pol's example she directed her captive to a bench, forcing him to sit down, and making sure there was enough distance between the combatants.

"What kind of stupid testosterone bender did you two go on?" she raged, pacing the room in front of them. "How old are you? Fifteen?"

"Ensign," T'Pol interrupted, but Hoshi didn't feel like being calmed down. "I'm not done yet, T'Pol."

"Can't you guys work out a better way to settle your differences than punching the fucking shit out of each other?" she fumed She knew she was treading on thin ice cussing off two superiors with the probation hanging over her head, but she didn't care. If there was one thing she couldn't stand, it was a guy who settled his arguments with his fists. The disappointment that Malcolm had taken part in it cut deep.

She saw that both men looked at her completely dumbfounded. She didn't know if that was because they had punched each other's brains out of service or because they had assumed this 'shy wallflower' wouldn't ever say shit even if she had a mouthful of it.

"Don't look at me like you don't understand shit, Malcolm," she said and to her chagrin she heard her own voice break. "All the time you have that damn stick so far up your ass you're gagging on it. You can't even return a smile to save your life. But when you get your knickers in a twist because Trip doesn't act as aloof as you, you lose it?"

"Yeah, you should really learn how to return a smile, Malcolm," she heard a sarcastic voice from behind and froze. "But don't try it with that face Lieutenant, because at the moment you look like the aftermath of a tragic farming accident."

Hoshi did of course know who that voice belonged to, and turned around slowly. The scowling captain stood near the entrance, leaning against the wall.

"C-captain," she stammered.

"Surprised, Ensign?" he said. "Do you really think security won't call me if two of my bridge offers run through the corridors as if their hair is on fire? Not that they could have hidden it anyway. Look at them. They look like poster boys for reconstructive surgery."

"We had noticed the building tension between Commander Tucker and Lieutenant Reed. Unfortunately we were too late to prevent the altercation," T'Pol admitted.

"So much is obvious," the Captain replied. "Subcommander, Ensign, please escort these gentlemen to the brig. Make sure you separate them. We don't have a morgue on board."

Hoshi watched the door shut behind the retreating captain. "Great, just fucking great," she swore in defeat.

=/\=

Trip woke up in the brig. Shortly after having been delivered there by a distinctly reproachful looking T'Pol he had fallen asleep from the exhaustion. It was amazing how T'Pol managed to get her mood across with little modifications to her face expression. When he sat up he saw Lieutenant Reed sit on his bunk in the neighboring cell.

Even during the fight his views on the Brit had changed. Yes he was probably still too uptight, but the Brit needed to run his security team with a stricter regime than he could afford in Engineering. To his chagrin he had noticed too late that he had not thought about that before making up his opinion of the tactical and security officer. Well, maybe this fight had at least brought a chance to open a crack in the tough shell of the former spook.

Trip really liked Hoshi. To everyone, who bothered to look, it was quite obvious that there was quite a bubbly personality hidden behind this wallflower façade. She had made it quite clear that she didn't care much for how they had resolved their differences, but maybe in the end she could even profit from it. Maybe if he tried talking to the man now that they didn't have much other entertainment options anyway...

"She's got spunk, doesn't she?" he said to the Brit in the adjacent cell.

"Who?" the other man answered and Trip saw that he was still slightly wary, but he could also sense a willingness to open up, at least a little.

"Who – Hoshi of course. And she seems to have a veritable crush on you," Trip replied, rolling his eyes.

"I doubt it would help in my situation if I added fraternization to the list of regulation violations, Commander."

"I have to say, you pack quite a punch," Trip said sincerely. "I was undefeated sectional and regional champion in '38 and '39 and I've fought against some really bad-ass types, but nobody ever thrashed me like you did."

"Trust me Commander, I've noticed you weren't boxing for the first time," the Brit answered and held his chin, moving his lower jaw. Trip could see that while their fight had been a rather juvenile way to settle things, but at least they had – literally – bashed some of their prejudices out of each other's heads.

"Would you drop the damn rank?" Trip said with a chuckle. "We're sitting in the brig together and who knows what our rank will be tomorrow. I'm Trip."

Since he couldn't offer a hand to shake through the wall between them, he put his fist against it. He could see the hesitation in the Brit's eyes. As a former spy he probably wasn't used to trusting anyone, but after a while that tough shell of the Lieutenant opened a little and he bumped his fist to the wall, too.

"Malcolm."

"Do you think they'll ever talk to us again?" Trip asked in reference to T'Pol and Hoshi, implicitly admitting that he liked the Vulcan Subcommander quite a bit.

"I wouldn't count on it," Malcolm snorted. "You've probably got better chances with your Subcommander. I think Hoshi made her opinion known quite unmistakably."

Trip laughed, noticing that the Brit had used her first name. "Now that I've thoroughly proven that I'm a 'volatile, primitive human', I'm probably top on T'Pol's shit-list right now. Too bad; she's actually quite companionable if you look past that Vulcan shell and believe it or not, she actually has a sense of humor. You're right in the middle of something and she delivers one of those dry Vulcan zingers."

"Not to forget pretty, too," Malcolm noted. "She's got an awfully nice bum."

With satisfaction Trip saw that the still stuffy Brit started to open up a little more. His commenting on another officers derrière would probably never have happened a day ago.

"I had the impression you were more fascinated with Hoshi's tush."

"Oh, you have no idea," Malcolm said and for the first time ever the chief heard the man actually chuckle. "It's exquisite and, believe it or not, I've actually seen it."

Trip sat up again and looked over at the man in the cell next to him.

"Now there's a story in there, Malcolm. And seeing we have not much else to do..."

"Remember when you sent me to Brazil to pick her up?"

Trip nodded.

"Well, Manaus control cleared me for a straight-in approach and I ended up being two hours early..."

=/\=

Jon heaved a sigh looking at the table in front of him. Breakfast was served and normally Trip would be sitting to the right, but his first officer was currently a VIP guest in the brig as a result of the brawl he'd staged with the ship's security officer the evening before.

It wasn't exactly how he had envisioned his first command. They hadn't even left space dock and they were already caught in the middle of a Vulcan conspiracy, and on top of that his officers were either starting to brawl or harboring crushes on each other. In two prominent cases, they were actually doing both.

He had known Hoshi Sato for some time already. Having been part of the jury that decided her fate during the disciplinary hearing after she had broken Captain Rodriguez's arm, he knew that her goody-two-shoes façade was no more than that – a façade. She was a lively little thing, who knew how to have fun. Had the jury been privy to what really had happened that evening, as opposed to the lame official story, she would not be in Starfleet anymore. But neither would several other officers who opted to go with the cover-up to save their own asses and went with the bullshit story of her breaking his arm after Rodriguez had tried to sweep the gambling chips off the table.

Granted, disclosing that she actually kicked the shit out of him because he tried to feel her up in a drunken stupor while she was performing a striptease would have raised holy hell – especially since her audience featured several high-ranking officers, who visited the congregations solely because of this recurring element of her gambling weekends. So the cowardly lot of them had fabricated a cover story that put all the blame on her as that was way easier than admitting they were lusting over a fresh-faced cadet with an exhibitionist streak. At least they had the decency to let her off lightly, but even that was abused by some of the assholes, who had subsequently basked publicly in their 'benevolence'. The worst of them had been Commodore – now Admiral – Hiram Black.

He let out a snort, wondering whether those no-frat rules were actually a blessing in disguise. For all his past as an operative for whomever he had worked, his security officer was quite inept at hiding his obvious crush on the ship's communication officer. Jon doubted Reed knew what he was getting himself into if he really dated someone as feisty as the slender girl behind the comms console.

But the truth was, Starfleet was very 1800. They had trusted him with the captaincy of Starfleet's first warp five ship, but somehow they didn't trust him to keep duty and private lives separated between him and Erika, letting him and her know that they preferred a break-up. That was just typical of a bunch of people who had never been farther from home than Jupiter. Did they really think they could make a whole ship of people live like nuns and monks?

Some of Trip's personnel had been on the construction crew for months now and even without having shipped out yet, at least eight of them had been dumped already because their significant other couldn't cope with weeks of separation. So unless Starfleet could supply him with eighty-five eunuchs, they'd better work something out for ships that were sent out into deep space for very long periods of time.

There was one group of people who knew how to handle long stints in deep space – the boomers, and he had one of them on his ship. That was why he was currently waiting for the resident space boomer to join him for breakfast.

A few minutes later said boomer entered the room, looking rather uncomfortable.

"Take a seat, Travis," Jon said with an encouraging smile. "This is breakfast, not a court hearing."

"Thank you captain," the young man answered and sat down, looking at him expectantly.

Jon pointed at the bread rolls before addressing his guest.

"You've spent your whole life in space, haven't you?"

"Born and raised on the _Horizon_, sir."

"Well, I could use some of your experience," Jon said. "And I expect everything that's said to stay in this room. Understood?"

"Perfectly, sir."

"How were your parents handling intimate relationships between people?" he asked, straight to the point.

"They usually didn't have to, sir. Nobody would be crazy enough to sign on to a boomer crew and leave his spouse behind. We had cargo runs that took a year and longer. In fact my parents only hired married couples or at least engaged ones, so that dad got to officiate at some weddings."

Jon chuckled at the enthusiastic grin of the young pilot.

"May I speak freely, sir?" Travis asked suddenly.

"Go ahead," Jon said with a nod.

"What Starfleet's doing is crazy. Just two days ago we got this pamphlet from command reminding us of the no-frat regulations. What do they expect? The crew is two-thirds male, most of them either single or leaving their better halves behind, and if they think the girls don't have needs too they are living in a fantasy world. Two months out we could have a crisis on our hands. It just doesn't work."

"I was afraid you'd say that," Jon sighed and saw that Travis was dead serious. The young man was enthusiastic about his new job and was usually grinning most of the day, but right now he wore a distinct expression of concern.

"I don't want to get people in trouble, but there is discontent among the crew, especially the noncoms. Some are thinking about resigning after that… I don't even know a printable word to call it... pamphlet."

"Signed by Admiral Black?" Jon asked dryly. The young ensign nodded.

"Right, that's it," Jon said and threw his napkin down. "Time for Starfleet command to get a reality check. You've been a great help, Travis."

"By the way sir," the young man said, audibly apprehensive. "About Commander Tucker and Lieutenant Reed. Are they in trouble?"

"Only if they hook up with the respective women they seem to fancy," Jon replied deadpan. There was no point in pretending that Travis didn't know it yet as both Tucker and Reed were utterly useless at hiding their crushes on T'Pol and Hoshi.

Travis laughed.


	8. New Challenges

**New Challenges**

"Nah, always wanted to be an engineer. If it was for the top brass, I'd probably be a Captain by now and would be looking forward to spending the rest of my career behind a desk at R&D."

"So this whole good ol' boy routine is just a ploy to stay out of the spot-light on the promotion list?"

"Now you got it, Malcolm. But after our stunt yesterday, I'd say promotion is the least of our worries right now."

Hoshi didn't believe her ears. The very same men who'd beaten the raw stuffing out of each other the day before were now sitting on their bunks in the brig, exchanging stories. Well, at least it looked as if they had gotten their problems out of the way, even if she didn't care much for the methods of how this change had come along.

She and T'Pol handed over the PADDs with Captain Archer's orders and the guard opened the doors to let them in.

"Ensign, Subcommander," the men offered their greetings to the women and each of them looked at their respective visitor with visible apprehension and embarrassment.

"We've come to do our Florence Nightingale bit, but if you think we're doing it because we've become pub brawl groupies, forget it," Hoshi said. She was still disappointed in Malcolm and Trip, but a good night of sleep and seeing them talk quite civilly started to dissipate her anger. But it was to too early to show that. "The Captain wants to keep the number of people who see you like that to a minimum."

She carefully pushed the Lieutenant back until he was lying on the bunk looking up at her. Even though he was technically a superior officer, he seemed willing to let her take the initiative and strictly speaking he didn't really have much choice as being in the brig meant that he was temporarily suspended and his rank meant nothing. His swollen lip made it hard to guess if he was smiling or in pain, but Hoshi couldn't shake the impression that he even enjoyed being mothered a bit.

The swelling of his face had receded to a degree, but he still looked rather shabby with his skewed mouth due to the remaining swelling of his lip. She carefully applied an ice spray and some balm to his lip and the cut on his eyebrow. After that the young officer started to feel along his jaw to see if there were any swellings or painful spots. The lack of reaction indicated that this was not the case.

"I'm awfully sorry, Ens... Hoshi," he said and she could easily see the sincerity of his words in his eyes. For the first time a fleeting smile returned to her face when he used her name for the first time.

"You should be, but it's in the past now," she returned softly, feeling for other hidden injuries without it being strictly necessary. It was obvious that Trip had not landed too many successful punches. T'Pol would have a much larger task icing up and applying the gel to all the damaged bits on the other man's face.

"_How does the Commander look?" _she asked T'Pol in Vulcan.

_"Fairly comfortable, but heavily damaged," _came the reply, but not from T'Pol, but Trip.

Hoshi's head snapped up and she saw T'Pol looking at her with a raised eyebrow through the glass wall that separated the two cells.

"Are there any other hidden linguistic talents we need to know about, Commander?" Malcolm asked and for the first time Hoshi heard the man chuckle. She decided that it was a very nice sound.

"Standard, Russian, Spanish, Gaelic and Vulcan," the inhabitant of the neighboring cell reported. "Well, Vulcan's probably the least fluent on the list, but I can hold my own in a conversation, especially if it's about engineering topics."

=/\=

"Why did you learn Vulcan?" T'Pol asked, carefully applying some more of the cooling gel to his discolored and still swollen eye with her index finger.

"I've been part of the engineering corps since the warp 3 program and that meant we had your people constantly looking over our shoulders. One thing that always drove me mad was that they – of course – always spoke in Vulcan among themselves and I hated being left out. There was one professor though – a guy named Solan. We really got along well and, bless his patience, he taught me some Vulcan so I would know when our 'friends' plotted something I didn't like."

"You have met Professor Solan?" T'Pol asked, following Hoshi's example by running her fingers lightly along his jaw to check for hidden injuries.

"I'm not sure I was **supposed** to meet him, but yeah, I did. He was the only one remotely interested in actually helping us instead of just slowing things down. One day he sort of disappeared and I guess since the meeting yesterday we know why."

"Solan is of our clan," T'Pol confirmed, looking down at her charge. He appeared inordinately content with her touch, a feeling that to her surprise was fairly mutual. Since the light touch gave her an insight to the Commander's emotional condition, she sensed a chaotic mix of remorse about his fight with Lieutenant Reed, gratitude for her gentle touch, but also anger and sadness about losing contact to the Vulcan Professor he seemed to hold in high esteem.

"To think that they probably offed the man or locked him up somewhere makes me want to launch immediately and let Malcolm test his weapons on the High Command," he said, and she could easily sense his anger simmering close to the surface. Even without any touch-telepathic contact his emotion was clearly visible and the badly discolored eye made his mien even more menacing.

"Violence will lead to nothing," she tried to soothe him. "Solan is safe for now. He has neither been terminated, nor deported, but this is not the time to speak of it."

=/\=

Jon walked toward the brig, having just returned from his meeting with Admiral Forest. Unsurprisingly he had preached to the choir. Maxwell wasn't the problem, not even most of the other Starfleet bigwigs. The problem had a name – Black – Hiram Black, Admiral.

If it was down to this ultra-conservative zealot, all unmarried female personnel would have to undergo a virginity test before enrolling in Starfleet. But apparently the damn bigot hadn't had a problem with visiting Hoshi's gambling bashes every other weekend, watching her step out of her clothing to entertain her crowd. And he had it on good authority that Black always came **only** to watch Hoshi strip. What a two-faced scumbag.

Thankfully they had worked out a solution that did not require Black's approval and would make life somewhat palatable on a ship light years from home for a very long time. Since Forest had the final authority as far as mission specific orders were concerned, they had simply worked out a lengthy standing order. It was perfectly within Starfleet regulations, although perhaps not perfectly in the spirit of them. Now it was just a case of implementing the compromise without turning his ship into a flying high school, and if the conduct of his two senior bridge officers was anything to go by, the project didn't exactly start promisingly.

When he arrived at the brig he found his two prisoners chatting amicably. That was something new, as he had barely heard Reed speak so far except during the meeting with Forest and Soval. Both men went silent when they noticed his arrival.

After ordering the guard to open the cells, he ordered him to report back to security and the crewman left quickly. With a curt 'come out' gesture with each hand, he ordered his two rogue officers out of their cells. Both came to stand to attention before him. T'Pol and Hoshi seemed to have done a good job as assistant nurses, as except for the cut above Reed's eyebrow and the monstrous shiner on Trip's face, they were almost looking human again.

"You will be relieved that Starfleet will not press charges of assault on a fellow officer," he started without preamble. He could see that both would like nothing more than to sigh in relief, but he shot them a stern glance to make sure they continued to stand to attention. "Technically you were engaged in a legal sports activity, even if it got somewhat out of hand. You will, however, have the distinction of being the first crew members of this ship who earned themselves a reprimand for both violating fairness in sport and failure to observe mandatory safety precautions during a sports activity. Neither of you was wearing the mandatory head protector nor were you wearing cups to protect the family planning."

He continued to pace up and down before them slowly, now and then checking their reactions. Even Trip had managed to set up a face that showed little of what was going on in his mind.

"Needless to say, that reprimand will remain in your file for three years and that means you're out of the running when it comes to promotions for that duration," he lectured and caught the fleeting smile on the engineer's face.

"I know, Commander, for you that's not even a punishment," he said ironically. "But to make sure you will learn your lesson, I have decided that the extra energy you seem to possess will need to be channeled into more productive activities."

"You, Lieutenant Reed, have a certain non-approved foreign object up your rear end, according to a theory of our communications officer that I overheard yesterday," he decreed, relishing the distinct look of uneasiness on Reed's face. "It is therefore decided that you will bear the responsibility of a morale officer on this ship. You will oversee cultural and recreational activities of the crew in order to keep the crew's morale as high as possible."

"W-with all due respect, Sir," the Brit stammered. His look of unease had given way for one of horror.

"Yes, Lieutenant?" he asked and fixed the man with a hard stare.

"Wouldn't that be a task more suitable to someone, who is more... uh... socially adept than I?"

"Exactly that is the reason why I'm giving the job to you," Archer said, feeling a bit like he was twisting the knife, but he didn't feel the least bit guilty. "We're going to be away from home for a long time and you just admitted yourself that your social skills could use improvement. Take it as a learning experience. Our communications officer will surely be amendable to help you, if you ask nicely and practice smiling beforehand."

Jon whipped around when he heard a badly suppressed chuckle from Trip.

"You, Commander, should not laugh prematurely," he warned the engineer. "Since you seem to have a rather healthy need for movement to the point that you almost run yourself ragged, I've found you a nicely sedate activity to calm down once in a while."

Jon had to fight a laugh of his own when he saw the grin vanish from Trip's face in a hurry. The man was in trouble and he knew it.

"One of the first pieces of information Lieutenant Reed will encounter in his new capacity as the morale officer is the fact that Ensign Rao from Science is an accomplished painter and expert in alien artistry. She has offered to run a painting and sculpturing seminar for interested crew members."

"You don't want me to take up painting, do ya, Sir?" his first officer protested.

"Why, no, Commander," he said with a hint of righteous mischief. "You have volunteered to pose as a model for them should the need for one arise."

"Cap'n, I'm the first officer!" Trip complained with a look of shocked indignation.

"Where do the Starfleet regulations say 'Thou shalt not make for thyself a carved image or any likeness of the First Officer', Commander?" Archer asked back and could see Trip's posture slump in defeat.

"At ease," he ordered. "You will return to your quarters and get reacquainted with unrestricted movement for a while. I expect both of you in my ready room at 1400 to receive the latest orders from Starfleet. Trip, you will stop by at sickbay and get yourself an eye-patch. I'd rather have you look like a pirate than a bar brawler. The official cover story is that the two of you were attacked by a group of drunks while you were on the surface. I expect you to stick to that story. Dismissed."

He watched the two men leave hurriedly.

=/\=

Trip entered the ready room. T'Pol, Phlox and Malcolm were already there, so with his arrival all department leaders were present. That meant there were quite some substantial changes on the menu as Phlox wouldn't be called to a briefing unless it concerned literally the whole crew.

"Starfleet has finalized our mission profile and as a result there are several substantial changes in Starfleet regulations that apply specifically and only to this crew," the Captain began. "The full text of the standing order is currently being put in writing by Admiral Forest's staff, but I'll give you the general overview already."

"First of all, the mission length limit has officially been changed from three months to five years. We will probably start with a stint of no longer than two years, but five years is the planned standard length for exploratory missions in the future."

"That's one helluva a long journey," Trip said. They all were enthusiastic about going out exploring, but the reality of being away from the home planet and the family for a full five years gave a whole new perspective to it.

"Indeed," the Captain agreed. "As a result of that we need to take measures to avoid cabin fever and boredom as we could be on the way for months before encountering a planet suitable for shore leave. That's why you will all collect suggestions and ideas from your respective departments for recreational and cultural activities and forward them to Lieutenant Reed."

Trip hid a grin behind his hand when he saw Malcolm's frustrated eye-roll that was well hidden from the Captain, but quite clearly visible to him. Obviously the Brit didn't like being reminded of his new job. But then he remembered that Malcolm would at least not end up sitting still on a dais for hours in a toga – or perhaps even worse – without one. The grin vanished as quickly as it had come.

"The alcohol restrictions are being eased. Beer and wine may be consumed in reasonable quantities between the end of the shift and six hours before the start of the next one. That means, your brewery installation you've got hidden away somewhere in engineering will be relocated to the galley, Commander."

Trip's head snapped up. How the hell did the captain know? Did someone of his engineering team blab? Malcolm seemed to have guessed his thought and put a little pager on the table.

"The allergy scans," he explained dryly. "Every allergy case among the crew is registered in the medical database and regular scans taken to warn the respective crew members if their respective allergen is found in potentially dangerous quantities on the ship."

"And crewman Nijman in science is allergic to hops," the Captain supplied with a triumphant smile.

"Ok, ok," Trip relented. "We'll relocate it to the galley, but I insist that the people running it now are allowed to continue to do so. I'm not going to have engineering's reputation trashed by substandard brew."

"Granted," the Captain acknowledged with a nod. "While we're at it, Commander, I think I saw a swimming pool in the ship's schematics."

"C47," Trip confirmed. "But it's not operational. Somehow everyone forgot about the little detail of what happens if the grav-plating conks out and eight hundred tons of water form into a huge honking bubble."

"I take it you have started to consider remedies for this 'little detail'?" the Captain asked back.

"We're working on it," Trip answered without looking up, making notes on his PADD. "But frankly it isn't very high on our todo-list. Once we've launched, I think we can work something out."

"It doesn't need to be ready tomorrow, but keep it in mind," the Captain instructed and Trip could see there was more as ship's commanding officer hesitated slightly. Whatever was coming next must be a humdinger.

"As soon as the ship moves out of space dock under its own power, the regulations against fraternization are summarily suspended on a probational basis. The impact on discipline, crew efficiency and morale will be reviewed every three months. If no significant problems arise for a full year, the regulations will be rescinded for good."

Trip's mind worked overtime. Summarily suspended? That was a major concession on behalf of Starfleet.

"Just a minute, Cap'n," he started to ask. "Does that mean what I think it does?"

"I'm fairly sure it does," the Captain acknowledged. "Both personal relationships as well as non-committal intimate contact between consenting adults is permitted without restrictions regarding rank difference or position in the chain of command. This right can be rescinded, however, if the respective individuals fail to separate duty and private life."

Trip shook his head. That didn't sound like a good plan.

"You have concerns, Commander?" the Captain asked.

"This may come as a surprise, but the non-committal sex bit doesn't sound like a good idea. It could get messy, not to mention that we don't really want to become known throughout the galaxy as the 'chlamydia bomber'."

To Trip's surprise T'Pol sided with the Captain. He had expected her to think the same.

"Restricting intimate contact to committed partnerships is impractical. Such a restriction cannot be governed efficiently in any case. I submit it is more practical to either permit every form of consensual intimate contact or prohibit it altogether. Doctor Phlox can set up a regime of regular screening of sexually active crew members for sexually transmitted diseases. If we restrict intimate activities to committed relationships, close to a third of the crew will involuntarily still be subjected to deprivation of intimate activity."

"I concur," the Doctor chipped in. "Two thirds of the crew are male and only one third female, and there are a small number of transsexual individuals. Since we do not record sexual orientation, the imbalance could be lessened or even aggravated depending on how many homosexual individuals we have of each gender. If this remarkable concession by Starfleet is to be effective in any way, we should allow crew members to have contact with more than one intimate partner if they choose to do so."

"Well, good luck organizing enough contraceptives, doctor," Trip said. This still sounded like a bad idea. He was the last to spurn a one-night stand if the pressure in the cooker reached critical mass, but it could create problems down the line, especially with so many guys still ending up not getting laid. Unless Starfleet had assigned a few nymphomaniacs to the crew, some guy would snap at some point.

"Well, Doctor, if I'm informed right about the family structures of Denobulans, you would be the foremost authority on the topic," the captain half stated, half asked.

"Indeed."

"In that case I want you to work out some rules and educational programs to ensure that this crew won't implode in a few months."

"I shall do my best, captain," the doctor replied and Trip wondered just how ridiculously wide that grin could get if the doc really tried.


	9. Escalation

**Escalation**

_Ten days later..._

Captain Archer had just demanded that he made his way to the situation room on the double so by the sound of it, it was rather urgent. Not wanting to let the Captain wait for too long Trip to ran out of engineering and straight into Anna Hess, who was walking along the corridor towards the chamber to start her shift. With a loud thud they crashed down to the ground and Trip came to a stop on top of his second in command, his face buried between her humongous breasts. Anna giggled and playfully slung her arms around him.

"N-nother time p-perhaps, Lieutenant, I'm sorta bus..busy right now," he stuttered, climbing off her, embarrassed and confused. He held out his hand and helped the widely grinning woman up. He felt that his face must be a nice shade of purple right now.

"Sorry," he muttered and sped off.

"I'll hold you to that promise, chief," he heard her call after him with a giggle.

"Hold it!" he called out as the doors to the turbo lift were closing, and Malcolm pressed the button to open them again. Trip slid into the compartment and Malcolm closed the doors.

"Are you ok?" Malcolm asked as the lift started up and Trip felt the scrutinizing look of the Brit. "I'm not sure human skin is supposed to be that particular shade of purple."

"Just had a bit of an accident," Trip muttered, hoping that his former nemesis would let it go, but – alas – he didn't.

"What sort of... accident?" the man asked back and Trip felt like throttling him for his shit-eating grin.

"I ran Anna over and landed face first between the airbags; happy now?" Trip said hastily and to his astonishment, for the first time in the three weeks he'd known him, he saw Malcolm guffaw.

"I don't think we have time for that, Lieutenant," he said, trying to hide his embarrassment behind formality.

"I'm not the one who said I need to loosen up."

"You picked a helluva time for starting to do that, Malcolm," Trip groaned ironically and ran out of the lift after it had stopped.

=/\=

T'Pol wondered if the two men had gotten into an argument again when they entered the situation room. Lieutenant Reed looked rather uncharacteristically amused, while Commander Tucker was the one looking rather displeased. His face was flushed too, although that could just be a result of the exertion of running all the way from engineering to the situation room.

Once they were all seated, she directed her attention at the captain.

"The situation with the Vulcans is escalating," the captain started. "Three hours ago assistant ambassador Tos was apprehended by security forces, when he placed a listening device in Admiral Forest's office. I understand he has done that on a regular basis with not much success, because he found them every time. This time, however, Starfleet decided to put an end to it."

"They're not going to let that go easily," she heard Malcolm say.

"No they won't," the captain agreed and T'Pol could see a growing concern on all the faces around her. She started to wonder what that would mean for her place on the crew. She was a Vulcan after all.

"T'Pol, do you know someone called T'Runa?"

She had to force herself not to show her apprehension when she heard the name.

"T'Runa is my former handler," she admitted.

"Handler? What were you – a circus elephant?" came the interjection from Commander Tucker. She could clearly hear from his voice that he was offended.

"The term 'direct superior' is perhaps more palatable to you, Commander," she said in his direction and his scowl receded. She assigned me to my missions when I was working for the Ministry of Security."

"I knew it," she heard Lieutenant Reed mutter under his breath with what sounded like triumph.

"What did you know, Lieutenant?" the captain asked.

"When Ensign Sato found out that the listening devices were operating on Embassy frequencies, I suspected that Subcommander T'Pol had planted them," he admitted. "She was assigned to the embassy before coming aboard and has made an almost suspiciously great effort to integrate herself with the crew. Her rather specialized capabilities led me to believe that she is not a mere ambassadorial aide."

"A most logical conclusion, although we now know that I did not install them," she said and looked at him neutrally. "As for my effort to integrate with the crew: I have always been most interested to learn about humanity and wished to interact with your people more. In fact it is this interest and lack of distance to humans that led to the decision to recall me."

"I'm sorry, Subcommander," the Lieutenant apologized.

"There is no need to apologize. You were merely doing your job."

"Now that we've got that settled," the Captain interrupted and he appeared somewhat impatient to her. He went on quickly to the issue that was obviously most important to him.

"I suppose since this T'Runa was your 'handler', she is coming for you? We have received information from Starfleet intelligence that she is aboard a Vulcan cruiser headed for Earth."

"Undoubtedly," she confirmed. "Captain, I wish to request being released from my assignment. T'Runa is unusually ruthless. She will not hesitate to kill crew members in her attempt to apprehend me. I believe I can go into hiding on Earth," she offered, not wanting to endanger her shipmates.

"No you won't," the captain refused. "We are not turning our backs on you."

"Captain," she started to protest, but was cut off by her commanding officer.

"Attention everybody!" he ordered sharply and she shot up from her chair to stand to attention as did all the other attendees.

"T'Pol of Vulcan, are you willing to resign your commission from the Vulcan High Command and accept a brevet commission as a United Earth Starfleet Officer?" he asked in an official tone.

"I have already resigned my commission to the High Command," she replied deadpan and noticed that she had obviously disrupted a carefully rehearsed train of thought as her commanding officer looked at her in confusion.

"At ease," he said and all officers sat down again.

"T'Pol, had you considered letting me know about such a change?" he asked. She wondered why he appeared dissatisfied, considering that from his earlier question it was now clear that her resignation was a welcome change.

"I've only sent my resignation notice to the embassy last night. I thought it was appropriate to wait for a delivery confirmation from the High Command before informing you about it."

"Why last night?" the captain asked.

"I received a coded transmission, forwarded by the embassy, that the High Command found my intelligence reports about the ship and its crew less than satisfactory."

"Intelligence reports?" her superior and the ship's security officer asked loudly in unison.

"You've sent intelligence reports to the High Command, Subcommander?" Lieutenant Reed asked in a very clipped voice. He was visibly displeased.

"No, Lieutenant," she replied. "That is what the High Command finds so disagreeable about them – their absence."

She could hear Commander Tucker laugh and his exclamation "Attagirl!" could only mean some kind of approval or encouragement. She made a mental note to ask Ensign Sato about it, but the young female seemed rather busy at the moment, tapping her PADD repeatedly.

"So let me get this straight," the captain summarized with an amused look. "They expected intelligence reports about us and you sort of 'forgot' to do that. And when they reminded you of it, you told them where to shove it."

"Not in those exact words, but essentially – yes," she replied dryly.

"Your confirmation has arrived. We received it twenty minutes ago," Ensign Sato supplied and T'Pol could see that the young woman was deeply unsettled. She had apparently accessed the communications logs from her PADD and found the transmission.

"What is it Hoshi?" the captain asked.

"I suppose the words 'treason' and 'death sentence' are not normally part of a resignation confirmation?" she asked back, looking physically ill.

"Right, that's it," their commanding officer said, visibly angered. "Hoshi, contact Starfleet right after this meeting and tell Admiral Forest we will go with the backup plan."

"Aye, Captain."

"T'Pol," he said and she looked back at him. "You haven't yet answered the second part of my question. Are you prepared to accept a field commission from Starfleet?"

"I am, Captain."

"Attention!"

All officers sprang to attention again. "Repeat after me," he instructed and she acknowledged his instruction with a nod. She started to repeat the text passages each time prompted to do so by a very subtle nod from her commanding officer.

"Having received a field commission as an officer in Starfleet, I do solemnly swear,"

"that I will support and defend the Constitution of United Earth against all enemies, foreign or domestic,"

"that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same;"

"that I will well and faithfully carry out my assigned duties and responsibilities;"

"that I will obey the orders of the Prime Minister, the Minister of Space, and the officers appointed over me, according to Starfleet regulations and the laws of United Earth."

"Attention to orders!" the Captain barked out and T'Pol controlled the reflex to repeat that, too. "Computer, start recording. Today, March 15th 2151 T'Pol of Vulcan has sworn the oath of allegiance to Starfleet as witnessed by Captain Jonathan Archer, Commander Charles Anthony Tucker III, Lieutenant Malcolm Stuart Reed, Ensign Hoshi Sato and Ensign Travis LeVar Mayweather. By the authority invested with me by Starfleet Command, I grant to T'Pol of Vulcan a brevet commission as a Starfleet officer in the rank of Commander. Computer, stop recording."

T'Pol accepted the congratulations of her elated fellow officers and indulged Ensign Sato patiently when the young female embraced her.

=/\=

Trip sat back on his chair. He had been tempted to pull T'Pol into a hug after he had seen Hoshi do so, but he'd decided against it. He now looked back at the captain, who seemed to have more information waiting for them.

"The Vulcan cruiser with T'Pol's former agent aboard is about a day away from Earth, which means we have less than twenty-four hours to launch. Trip, what's the status in Engineering?"

"Snafu. We still have twenty-two of the plasma-flow regulators waiting to be exchanged and each of them takes close to two hours to change."

"Why so long?" was Jon's return question.

"Because someone thought it'd be a good idea to install them behind access hatches that not even a rat gets into without an effort. For each and every one you have to stop the plasma flow, let the ducts cool down, crawl in and change it and then reestablish the plasma flow."

"Then put more people on it," the captain demanded. "T'Pol's life could depend on it."

"I haven't got any more people who can do it. That's why I've changed all sixty something of them so far by myself. Anna, Taylor and Rostov are the other ones, who know how to install the Marconi type regulators. Neither of them even fits in these things. Taylor probably would, but we need her on the EPS grid. We thought we could try to change them without interrupting plasma flow and I tried once. It put my hand in a bandage for three days and fried the regulator. Only chance we could make it any faster would be working with a second person, but that person mustn't be any bigger than perhaps Hoshi. But we don't have anyone so small in engineering."

"If I'm the right size, what are we waiting for?" Hoshi asked.

"You forget that I got to read all your service records. You were all assigned when I was still ranking officer. And yours says quite clearly that you are claustrophobic. Have you any idea how small those hatches are? Anna can't even get into them at all with that massive rack of hers and Rostov can't either, because he's hurling weights in the gym all through his spare time. I can't do that to you, Hoshi."

"What a choice to make," she answered ironically and he could see the fear, but also a grim determination in her eyes. "Me being scared or T'Pol being dead. Only one of those conditions is permanent. I'll do it."

=/\=

"Bring those containers over here!" Travis ordered. "They go to cargo bay two, section A."

This was it. The ship was about to launch. Knowing that the Vulcans were coming after T'Pol, Starfleet had decided to assign _Enterprise_ to a cargo run to Starbase 74 in the Taurus system. Normally that task would be one for the warp 3 freighter _Siberia_, but _Enterprise_ could make the run in ten days as opposed to the three weeks it would take the other vessel, and it was a perfect excuse to get the ship away from Earth. Faked 'emergency requests' from the starbase had made the story more believable.

He felt good, sort of returning to the boomer days for once. Organizing the loading, storage and unloading of cargo took him back to his youth and he felt pleased by the fact that Captain Archer seemed willing to use his expertise in the matter.

Normally logistics were part of the engineering department and it would have been Lieutenant Hess or Ensign Mattes overseeing the transfer of supplies from the _Siberia_ to _Enterprise, _but the ship's commanding officer had opted to entrust someone with the job who had done exactly that sort of work all his life.

The grin never left his Travis's face as he herded the many crewman sent to help into the right directions.

=/\=

"Do you think I could do it with my eyes closed?" Hoshi asked and Trip could hear the fear in her voice.

He took her hand and held it as if they were two teenagers on a date.

"No problem, I'll just put your hands where they need to be. You are one brave little thing Hoshi."

"That remains to be seen," she sighed. Her voice still trembling.

Trip felt that holding her hand calmed her down and he decided that the weird appearance of two officers walking the corridors hand-in-hand was better than letting her stew in her fears all the way to engineering. There were only two people on the ship with any chance to fit into that hatch beside him – Hoshi and Liz Cutler. He had contemplated trying to get the job done with Cutler, but she would be needed to help Phlox patch them up in sickbay if they were too slow on only one of the twenty-two remaining regulators, so there was really no other choice than hoping that Hoshi would somehow pull through. He hated putting her through this, as he liked the young ensign quite a bit.

Once they came near the hatch he could feel how Hoshi started to shake with apprehension. He spun her around and hugged her close.

"You'll be fine, Hoshi," he whispered and he felt that she relaxed a little, if not much.

He grabbed a regulator out of his box and directed his new assistant to sit down on the floor. He could see that she had her eyes squeezed shut already. He lay down in front of the cramped hatch and with gentle directions he made Hoshi to do so as well. His right arm was behind her neck and he hooked his hand into her right armpit; putting the new regulator on his chest, he grabbed the opening and dragged them into it by sheer force. He could feel Hoshi helping a bit with her feet.

"Stop," he said and carefully removed his right arm from under her, which wasn't very easy in the cramped space. He took her hands and put them on either side of the wonky regulator.

"When I say 'now', you just pull on it, but not too hard or you'll knock the wind out of yourself," he instructed. "Just throw it to your right. We haven't got more than a second. Ready?"

"R-ready," she said in a scared voice.

He took the new regulator off his chest and aligned it properly, so he only had to shove it in. "Ok, three, two, one, _now_!"

Hoshi pulled and emitted an 'oof!' sound as the part landed heavily on her chest. A clanking sound could be heard as she let it fall to the right. He shoved the new one in as soon as her hands were away. A few sparks flew, but nobody was burned.

One down – twenty-one to go.

=/\=

Hoshi felt his strong hands put hers on the regulator again. Having done the routine for twenty-one times over the last eight hours, she now had a well tuned feeling for how hard she had to yank the part without painfully thumping her own chest with it.

Their uniforms were soaked in sweat by now and her wet hair was plastered to her forehead. Upon his signal she pulled out the part and threw it to her right. The now familiar crackling of sparks told her that he had managed to push the new part in.

Soon after she felt her body start to slide and she heard his labored breathing. He had dragged them in and out of those cramped access hatches no less than twenty-two times and he was audibly exhausted.

"You can open the eyes, darlin', we've done it," she heard him say.

She rolled over onto his chest and placed a quick kiss on his lips. "Thank you," she said gratefully and afforded him a big smile. "I couldn't have done it without you."

"Wouldn't that be my text, Hoshi?" he asked back with smile that was equally grateful.

"You're really going to be busy in off-duty time, if you keep up like that, Chief," she heard a giggled statement from the left. Looking up Hoshi saw a grinning Anna Hess looking down on the pile on the ground. She took the lieutenant's offered hand and stood up, watching as Trip's second in command extended the same courtesy to him. She saw that she was whispering something in his ear while handing him two fresh uniforms, causing him to blush.

"There's a shower over there," he said, pointing to a door beside his office once Anna had resumed her other tasks. He handed her one of the clean coveralls.

"What about you?" Hoshi asked back.

"I'll wait until you're done," he said evasively, still blushing slightly.

"Don't be silly," Hoshi snorted and took him by the hand, dragging him toward the shower. "I need someone to scrub my back and so do you."


End file.
